Greek violence rages ahead of parliamentary vote

Clashes between youths and police extended deep into the night after hundreds of people gathered late Saturday in the capitals Exarchia district, at the site of the December 6 shooting of 15-year-old Alexis Grigoropoulos.

In Athens, protesters occupying the Athens Polytechnic University hurled firebombs and rocks at police who responded with tear gas, while clashes there and around the country saw police cars, a government building and banks targeted with the unrest spreading to the port city of Piraeus and the island of Crete.

Unions piled extra pressure on the right-wing government ahead of the parliamentary budget vote.

Under-fire Prime Minister Costas Karamanlis administration wants to reduce Greece’s national debt -- which this year stands at 93.9 percent of GDP, one of the highest in Europe.

The conservative leader said last week that Greece expects to pay about 12 billion euros (16 billion dollars) in 2009 to service its debt, amounting to over 19 percent of its revenue and nearly five percent of its gross domestic product.

The depth of anti-government sentiment witnessed over the past fortnight has also begun to bite in opinion polls published Sunday.

Pollsters Public Issue have the socialist opposition taking a lead on 38.5 percent as against Karamanlis New Democracy, with 32.5 percent, according to the liberal Kathimerini newspaper.

Socialist leader Georges Papandreous approval rating has also overtaken that of Karamanlis, the poll said.

In the centre-left Vima, a similar pattern of voting intentions was recorded by Kapa Research.

Karamanlis -- whose government relies on a fragile single-seat majority in the 300-deputy parliament -- has consistently shrugged off opposition calls to resign, announcing financial measures to support the business and tourism sectors hard-hit by the unrest.

Hundreds of shops and banks in Athens and elsewhere have sustained damage in street violence.

Again on Saturday, the giant Christmas tree on Athens main square outside the parliament building was targeted by protesters. The tree was only replaced on Tuesday after the original was torched at the height of unrest following the schoolboy’s death.

Later, a group threw a petrol bomb at a building housing a banking services company, although a fire was quickly brought under control.

In a western suburb of Athens, demonstrators threw Molotov cocktails at the police academy and torched six police vehicles, although again without casualties, police said.

Groups of youths continue to set fire to garbage cans after dark in various parts of the city.

Athens and other Greek cities have seen daily protests over Grigoropouloss death that have frequently turned violent.

In the northern city of Thessaloniki, youths occupied a hall being used for a film festival while others pelted the city mayor with pastries, police said.

Masked youths Friday attacked the French cultural institute in Athens after about 1,000 students and communist activists staged a march to condemn a second shooting on Wednesday in which the son of a teachers union official was slightly wounded.

Protesters demanding justice over Grigoropouloss death continue to occupy hundreds of schools and many universities across Greece.

The Athens Polytechnic, site of a 1973 student uprising that hastened the fall of military dictatorship in Greece, is among the occupied campuses.

Meanwhile, about 1,300 German police mobilized on Saturday to shepherd 1,000 Greek protest sympathizers in the northern port city of Hamburg arrested 10 people and suffered four injuries during a march on the Greek consulate.