ATHENS (Reuters) – Clashes broke out in Athens on Friday between the police and students who were demonstrating against a bill, under discussion in Parliament, paving the way for the establishment of private universities in the country.
Thousands of students have been demonstrating peacefully for weeks in Greece against this reform project from the conservative government of Kyriakos Mitsotakis, fearing for the future and the value of public education diplomas.
But the mobilization took a more virulent turn in the face of the inflexibility of the executive. Students threw Molotov cocktails at police officers on Friday.
“A young person today cannot make a plan for the future. We are faced with dead ends,” laments Stratos Katselis, 25, who fears not being able to find a job given his diplomas.
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Kyriakos Mitsotakis defends this text on the grounds that, according to him, it will put an end to the exodus of tens of thousands of Greek students to foreign campuses, a loss of income for the national economy.
The bill is expected to be adopted, with the government having a majority of 158 MPs out of 300 in Parliament.
(Report by Angeliki Koutantou and Louisa Gouliamaki, French version by Sophie Louet)
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