Tuesday witnessed street violence in Athens and other cities around Greece on the occasion of the anniversary of a 1973 students’ uprising, with left-wing parties organizing rallies and commemorations and with police responding with arrests and roadblocks to enforce a Covid-19-related ban on public assemblies.
The annual Polytechnic uprising commemoration involves the laying of wreaths at a monument within the historic campus in central Athens, along with a march by protesters to the US embassy via Parliament.
Some 200 members of the Communist Party first ignored the lockdown order and held an assembly outside the US embassy, while later scenes of street violence involving both riot police and some protesters followed in central Athens.
