Patra ponders solutions after clashes at factory housing migrants
Authorities in Patra held an emergency meeting on Wednesday to discuss ways of tackling the presence of hundreds of illegal immigrants in the city, following violent clashes between police and supporters of Chrysi Avgi (Golden Dawn).
Five people were arrested, eight policemen injured, one police bus and two motorcycles were damaged during the fighting on Tuesday night.
Dozens of locals had gathered outside a disused factory near the port area used as makeshift accommodation by undocumented migrants to protest the fatal stabbing last week of a 30-year-old local man. Three Afghan migrants are suspected of attacking the victim after a disagreement.
However, the protest was broken up by dozens of supporters of the far-right party who clashed repeatedly with riot police.
The Governor of Western Greece, Apostolos Katsifaras, asked for the police presence in the city to be stepped and for the factory where the migrants are squatting to be cleared in order to defuse the situation.
?Evacuating the buildings at Peiraiki-Patraiki, in conjunction with more policing around the whole old factory area would help calm the situation down,? he said.
