http://imarketnews.com/node/12929
A Branch Of Greece Finance Ministry Set On Fire By Rioters
ATHENS (MNI) - A building belonging to Greece's Finance Ministry was set afire Wednesday by rioters protesting the stringent four-year austerity plan the Greek government has agreed to accept in exchange for up to E110 billion in aid from fellow Eurozone countries and the International Monetary Fund.
The Finance Ministry issued a statement Wednesday night saying that no crucial documents had been lost, though the damage to the building was extensive.
The fire came on a day when a general strike against the government's new fiscal plan erupted into violence, leaving three dead and tens of others wounded. In Athens, protesters gathered around the Parliament while some groups threw fire bombs at buildings, cars and banks. The police answered with tear gas and arrests.
A fire bomb thrown into a branch of the Marfin Bank in Athens, which was open despite the strike, killed three employees while five others were rescued from the balcony of the burning building, the Athens fire department said.
"The country is at the edge of the abyss," said Greek President Karolos Papoulias.
The 48-hour strike in Greece's public sector started Tuesday, and private sector workers joined in on Wednesday. All government offices, services, ports, airports, schools and hospitals were shut down as tens of thousands of people took to the streets.
Even Greek journalists were on strike, but they later went back to work in order to cover the riots.
The protesters are focusing their fury on the government's proposed E30 billion savings plan, which includes significant cuts in public sector salaries and pensions, the abolition of most benefits and bonuses, and increases in consumer taxes.
"The people are losing their rights and their future. The country cannot surrender without a fight," said Yiannis Panagopoulos, president of the GSEE -- one of Greece's two largest union organizations, which was instrumental in orchestrating the strike.
The Socialist Party government announced that it will table the austerity plan in Parliament Thursday under an emergency procedure which stipulates that there will be no debate and that the bill can be passed with a simple majority of 151 out of the 300 seats in Parliament. The Socialists hold 160 of those seats, so passage should be assured.
Greece's Prime Minister George Papandreou said he will call an emergency council of all political leaders under the president of the republic to discuss the strikes and riots.
He called on all political parties to denounce the violence and urged them to "undertake their responsibilities and not hide behind the decisions the government was forced to take to avoid bankruptcy."
He added: "The country is facing tough times and we must all be clear."
The country's Finance Minister George Papaconstantinou told the Financial Times in an interview Tuesday that, "we have made mistakes" but the new austerity plan will "prove our complete determination to face the problems and exit recession soon."
The package of spending cuts and tax hikes is intended to reduce the public budget deficit by 5.5 percentage points of GDP this year alone, from 13.6% to 8.1%. It is envisioned that by 2014, the deficit will be brought under the EU's limit of 3%. But in that same year, outstanding public debt is projected to be an astronomical 144% of GDP, up from 113% in 2009 -- leading many to predict that a Greek bond default is inevitable.
