Overview
- Thousands of students and teachers marched through Athens on Wednesday, with parallel demonstrations and tent occupations reported in Thessaloniki and Patras.
- Protesters called for affordable student housing, larger rent subsidies, free public education and more state investment to fix overcrowded classrooms and staff shortages.
- Teachers staged at least a one-day strike and the civil servants’ union called a work stoppage and a rally in Athens to broaden pressure on the government.
- Riot police closely monitored marches and conducted spot checks while shops and cafes along routes closed their shutters as a precaution.
- The movement ties into wider European unrest over rising living costs and will test Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis’s government as it balances fiscal limits with political risk ahead of next year’s election.