BBC

Riots have broken out in several Greek cities after police shot dead a teenager in the capital Athens.
The unrest began in Athens soon after the shooting in Exarchia district, a regular scene of clashes between police and leftist groups.
Youths threw petrol bombs, burned cars and smashed shop windows.
Riots then spread to Thessaloniki, Greece's second largest city, to the northern cities of Komotini and Ioannina, and to Crete.
Two officers have been suspended, and an inquiry is under way.
Interior minister Prokopis Pavlopoulos said in a statement: "The government expresses its profound regret over this incident.
"An inquiry on the circumstances of the death has already begun and, if the policemen are found to have been derelict in their duty, the punishment will be exemplary."

Resignation offered
In Athens police fired tear gas at hundreds of stone-throwing youths, who went on a rampage as news of the shooting spread.

After a lull of a couple of hours, rioting resumed shortly after midnight local time (2200 GMT), with some protesters marching through Athens city centre and others fighting police outside the National Technical University of Athens, the Associated Press news agency reported.
One British student in Exarchia, whose accommodation is on the road leading to the university, said the scene was "unbelievable".
"The air is thick with burning fuels, it's very hard to breathe. It looks like something out of a war film, like Black Hawk Down, and I say that without over-estimation," Jonathan Recaldin wrote to the BBC News website.
In Thessaloniki dozens of youths attacked a police precinct, while others blocked a road near the university campus.

People were being encouraged to join in the protests via some websites, AP said.
An Interior Ministry press officer told Reuters news agency that Mr Pavlopoulos had offered his resignation to Prime Minister Costas Karamanlis, but it had been rejected.
Police issued a statement after the shooting, saying a patrol car with two officers inside was attacked by about 30 youths throwing stones.
They were attacked again and responded, with one firing a stun grenade and the other shooting and fatally wounding the boy, AP quoted the statement as saying.
The BBC's Malcolm Brabant in Athens says the shooting and rioting are certain to ramp up clashes between anarchists and police. The Exarchia area is regarded as a fortress by anarchists who frequently lure police into it, then attack them with rocks.
A similar shooting in 1985 led to years of violence.
Residents have recently protested over rising crime and lawlessness, and complain that the police fail to answer emergency calls, staying barricaded in their police stations, our correspondent adds.

Greek ministers pledge crackdown on rioters after third night of chaos
• Thousands join protests, burning and looting cities
• Funeral of boy at centre of protests takes place today

by Helena Smith in Athens, The Guardian,

Students confront police outside parliament in Athens as the Greek prime minister, Costas Karamanlis, condemned the three days of violence Link to this video

Greek police are braced for more violence around the funeral today of a teenage boy shot dead by police, after rioting youths brought a third night of chaos to Greek cities.

The government denied reports it would declare a state of emergency, but last night the interior minister, Prokopis Pavlopoulos, signalled the authorities will take a firmer stance against rioters in the worst disturbances to hit the country since the collapse of military rule in 1974.

Emerging from a three-hour emergency cabinet meeting, he said: "What is happening both for the economy of our country and our democracy is unacceptable. We will not tolerate these events. We will do what we must."

But thousands took to the streets again, burning shops and buildings and even setting alight a Christmas tree in the centre of Athens. One hotel's windows were smashed and guests evacuated. The four-storey Olympic Airways office in central Athens was completely burned, as well as a bank and more than 130 shops.

Rioters threw rocks and petrol bombs at riot police and set up barricades across downtown streets. Smoke rose above the city centre, mingling with clouds of teargas. Broken glass littered the streets.

The disturbances also intensified in the country's second-largest city, Salonika, where masked and hooded youths threw rocks and petrol bombs at riot police, who responded with teargas. Rioting also broke out in Trikala, a city in the country's agricultural heartland.

Demonstrators occupied the Greek consulate in Berlin, and in London five men were arrested after protesters clashed with police outside the Greek embassy.

The riots were triggered by an incident late on Saturday in which 15-year-old Alexandros Grigoropoulos was shot dead by a policeman, allegedly at point-blank range, after youths were said to have thrown objects at a patrolling police car in the gritty Athenian district of Exarchia.

Earlier yesterday, the prime minister, Costas Karamanlis, accused "extremists" of exploiting the shooting and pledged to take "immediate" action to compensate those whose properties had been destroyed, saying: "The state has a duty to protect society and the citizen."

But the sheer scale of the destruction has put the ruling New Democrats on the defensive. "It is as if the state [machinery], the government, has collapsed," said Ioannis Rougissis, a spokesman for the opposition Pasok party.

The Pasok leader, George Papandreou, lashed out at the New Democrats - who are in power with a wafer-thin majority - for being out of touch with reality. "The whole country, every citizen, is exasperated with a government that doesn't understand the real problems of the people," he said. "Everyone is saying enough is enough."

The shooting of the schoolboy on Saturday quickly laid bare the simmering tensions between the police and members of alleged anarchist groups, who retaliated by going on the rampage. But the teenager's death has given vent to a deeper anger that has also been mounting in Greece.

With many struggling to make ends meet, and one in five living below the poverty line, there is growing anger at the tough fiscal policies of a government determined to reach the prescriptive benchmarks set out by Brussels and rein in budget deficits. The disaffection has been exacerbated by allegations of corruption and a series of scandals implicating members of Karamanlis's inner circle.

High school students have rushed to join the protests, throwing stones at police in clashes in front of the Athens parliament yesterday, and on islands and mainland towns nationwide.

"A lot of teenagers identify with Grigoropoulos," said Christos Mazanitis, an Athenian journalist. "There's a whole generation out there who see their parents in debt and feel they have nothing to look forward to in the future. Fear and despair are what these riots are about."

Athens 'calm' as violence abates

Calm has begun returning to Athens after four days of rioting, Greek police say.

The situation in the capital was mostly quiet, Panayiotis Stathis, a police spokesman, said on Tuesday, as police deployed more than 15,000 officers and arrested scores of people.

But police are bracing themselves for new disturbances on Wednesday, when labour unions are planning rallies during a nationwide general strike against government economic policies.

Groups of youths continued to be holed up in a university building where officers have no access due to a tradition of university asylum.

Protesters clashed with police guarding the Greek parliament on Tuesday as thousands attended the funeral of Alexandros Grigoropoulos elsewhere in the capital.

The 15-year-old boy's shooting death on Saturday triggered the most violent riots in the country in a quarter century which have dealt a major blow to the country's increasingly unpopular conservative government.

Raw nerve

Hundreds of demonstrators threw petrol bombs and other projectiles at the police on Tuesday, before riot police charged to push them back towards Syntagma square in Athens.

The central square had been the scene of violence on Monday night when rioters torched shops, government ministries and banks.

The killing of Grigoropoulos has touched a raw nerve among young Greeks, angry at years of political scandals and rising levels of poverty and unemployment, worsened by the global economic downturn.

Stathis, the police spokesman, said 89 people had been arrested for attacks on police, vandalism and looting since the violence began.

Another 79 people had been detained for questioning over the riots in which dozens of police officers have been injured.

Funeral calm

At Grigoropoulos's funeral at the municipal cemetery of Palio Faliro, a residential suburb in southern Athens, some groups shouted anti-police slogans but it was mainly calm after a request from the family that respect be shown for the dead teenager.

Earlier, Karolos Papoulias, Greece's president, had appealed for calm, calling on Greeks to "honour Alexis' memory peacefully".

"This is a day of mourning for us all... but there must be respect for institutions and laws," Papoulias said in a statement.

Two officers have been charged over the shooting - one with premeditated manslaughter and the illegal use of a weapon and the other as an accomplice.

They are due to appear before a court on Wednesday and both have been suspended - along with the Exarchia precinct police chief.

Government under pressure

Demonstrations and violence played out in similar ways in other cities across the country as George Papandreou, the Socialist opposition leader, demanded that the conservative government step down and call elections to help end the violence.

Addressing his parliamentary group on Tuesday, Papandreou said: "We claim power. The only thing this government can offer is to resign and turn to the people for its verdict."

Costas Karamanlis, Greece's prime minister, has vowed to end the country's worst unrest in decades, but a government spokesman denied reports that the government planned to declare martial law.

Greek labour unions rejected an appeal by Karamanlis on Tuesday to cancel a mass protest planned for Wednesday to avoid further violence.

"Our answer is that the strike and the rally will take place as planned," said Stathis Anestis, spokesman for GSEE, Greece's largest labour confederation.

The 24-hour nationwide strike and rally, which was arranged before the shooting took place, is taking place to protest against the government's economic policies and reforms.

Street war rages for eighth day

ATHENS - Rioting youths attacked a police station, stores and banks and fought running battles with police, authorities said, as violent protests against a police killing continued for the eighth straight day.

The clashes broke out as candlelight vigils were being held to mark a week since the police shooting of a 15-year-old boy, which triggered the riots that are threatening the stability of the Government.

Police suddenly charged a peaceful candlelight vigil in Syntagma Square, in central Athens, when the crowd of several hundred people refused to back off its position near Parliament. The protesters retreated but the tense confrontation continued.

Youths - some on foot, others riding motorcycles - attacked a police station with petrol bombs as well as at least three banks, several stores and a Government building.

Several hundred protesters set up burning barricades and attacked police with rocks and flares. Riot police fired teargas and chased the youths through parts of the city. The protesters chanted "murderers out" and used laser pointers to target police for attack.

Violence has racked Greece every day since the death of teenager Alexandros Grigoropoulos. The riots in cities throughout the country have left at least 70 people injured. Hundreds of stores have been smashed and looted, and more than 200 people have been arrested.

While most of the protesters have been peaceful, the tone of the demonstrations has been set by a violent fringe. And more young people have been willing to join those fringe elements than in the past.

Hundreds of schoolchildren holding candles gathered peacefully outside Parliament and at the site where the teenager was shot. At the latter site, hundreds of masked self-styled anarchists gathered among the largely peaceful crowd and, on leaving, clashed with riot police who used copious amounts of tear gas to clear the area.

Some of the rioters entered the National Technical University nearby from which they pelted police with rocks and flares.

Outside Parliament, they left candles spelling out the name "Alex" in front of a line of riot policemen.

The young protesters promised to remain on the streets until their concerns - including opposition to the increasingly unpopular Government and worry over economic issues - are addressed.

"Speaking as an anarchist, we want to create those social conditions that will generate more uprisings and to get more people out in the streets to demand their rights," said 32-year-old protester Paris Kyriakides.

"In the end, the violence that we use is minimal in comparison to the violence the system uses, like the banks," Kyriakides said.

Earlier yesterday, a crowd of about 1000 people demonstrated in the northern city of Thessaloniki.

- AP