Police fire tear gas, water cannon at anti-government rioters

Protests erupt during Hungarian ceremony
By Pablo Gorondi -- The Associated Press
October 23, 2006 -- BUDAPEST, HUNGARY -- Police fired rubber bullets in the air and used tear gas and water cannon today to disperse a crowd of anti-government protesters, as Hungary commemorated the 50th anniversary of its anti-Soviet uprising.

Protests on Kossuth Square outside parliament started on Sept. 17, when a recording was leaked revealing Socialist Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsany admitting that the government lied about the economy before its re-election in April. -- The protesters had vowed to stay until Gyurcsany was dismissed, but police pushed them off the square after they refused to submit to security checks. But authorities did not dismantle the dozens of tents set up by the protesters, and were expected to allow the demonstrators to return after today's events.

As the commemoration events began, state news wire MTI said police beat some of the protesters -- including women and elderly people -- with rubber batons, leaving some with head injuries.

By late afternoon, protesters began gathering in different spots near the center of the city. A few hundred protesters set up road blocks with garbage cans and threw rocks at the police dressed in riot gear, who used large amounts of tear gas and several water cannon to disperse them on Bajcsy-Zsilinszky Road, near St. Stephen's Basilica. -- At the same time, Fidesz-Hungarian Civic Union, the main center-right opposition group, was holding their own 1956 commemoration just a few blocks away. According to MTI, over 100,000 people were at the rally.
Copyright © 2006, The Associated Press