Greeks Besiege Acropolis as Protests Spread

ATHENS, Greece (May 4) -- As thousands of workers spilled onto the streets of the Greek capital to protest new austerity measures, some 200 communist supporters swarmed the Acropolis, Greece's most sacrosanct archaeological site, and unfurled banners reading: "People of Europe -- Rise up."

Instead, the markets fell as concerns deepened that the debt crisis that precipitated the tough Greek budget cuts could spread. London's FTSE 100 was down 1.2 percent, while the key index of the Madrid stock exchange was down 5.5 percent on the day, highlighting concerns over the Spanish government's fiscal stability.

The scene at the most important symbol of ancient Athenian democracy didn't leave just onlooking tourists aghast. "I'm a communist, but this is a disgrace," said Aliki Rizopoulou, phoning in to a radio talk show early today. "There's nothing catchy about having foreigners seeing us as wacky on top of being considered liars and cheaters."

Minutes after protesters lined up along the defensive walls of the Acropolis, they began picketing before the Parthenon, wielding red flags and shouting anti-government slogans for more than three hours before a state prosecutor ordered them to leave and riot police escorted them off the grounds.

Laden with over $400 billion in debt and a budget deficit of 13.6 percent of gross domestic product, Greece has been struggling to claw out of a financial crisis that has pushed the nation to the brink of bankruptcy and imperiled the fate of the euro 11 years after the currency's inception.

Pressed for cash after weeks of market turmoil, Athens announced a fresh raft of austerity measures in return for a $146 billion lifeline of loans from the European Union and the International Monetary Fund to prevent Greece from facing a humiliating bankruptcy.

The painful retrenchment is already facing vociferous opposition from unions and social activists who view the new measures -- mainly new hikes on sales tax and deeper cuts in pensions and public servants' pay -- as a "savage" attack on open-handed policies of the sort that Greeks -- and many other Europeans -- consider inalienable rights.

"People have the same problems everywhere [in Europe]," said Elias Vrettakos, vice president of Greece's civil servants union Adedy. "The measures of the government, though, the EU and the IMF, overtake our historic gains, abolish our rights and return society back to the 1960s."

But some of those rights would seem to fall short of inalienable by most objective measures. Consider early retirement.

Greece's average retirement age is 61.2, and the new reforms will increase that to 63. The reforms would also curtail the right to quit working as early as 50 for some professions deemed especially hazardous -- including television presenters allegedly exposed to bacteria in their microphones and grave diggers who have to work with dangerous chemicals to exhume human remains.

Such generous benefits have long bred tension with more frugal countries such as Germany, which finally agreed on Sunday to back the financial aid package for Greece in return for reforms that abolish such perks and remedy Athens' free-spending practices of the past.

On Tuesday, public servants, including state school teachers and hospital workers, kicked off a 48-hour nationwide strike that will paralyze key services. All flights will be grounded Wednesday, keeping this protest-rife land isolated from the rest of the world.

"We expect more than 100,000 [protesters] pouring onto the streets of Athens alone," union leader Vrettakos said late today in answer to a joint call from the country's two major unions for a general strike.

That protest comes as the beleaguered Socialist government of Prime Minister George Papandreou scrambles to implement the three-year austerity and reform program, due to be ratified by the 300-seat parliament this week.

"It will be chaos," predicts Daniel Toska, a 24-year-old jobless electrician. "People may protest, but they won't revolt."

Eventually, he add, "lads like me may have no other option than to pick up their belongings and leave [the country]."

Labor experts anticipate the austerity measures to yield 250,000 unemployed by the end of the year.