Hundreds of anarchists and left wing demonstrators clashed with police, who were trying to keep them apart from a gathering of neo-Nazis in central Athens on Saturday.

The anarchists, many wearing helmets and masks, threw petrol bombs and stones at riot police who responded with tear gas while the neo-Nazi demonstrators dispersed after an earlier tense stand-off between the two groups.

Anarchist groups set fire to a greek flag during their demonstration against a neo-nazi fraction gathering in central Athen Photo:AFP

The clashes occurred in the Exarchia student quarter where some 150 members of the extreme right-wing group Chryssi Avgi (Golden Dawn) had gathered outside their headquarters to protest a ban on Eurofest, a planned gathering of European neo-Nazi and fascist parties in Greece this weekend.

The right-wing demonstrators, mostly young and wearing helmets, waved Greek flags and brandished black shields emblazoned with a Celtic cross, as they listened to speeches by their leader and the Italian head of extreme right-wing party, Forza Nuova, Roberto Fiore.

Fiore claimed Eurofest had taken place in Italy last weekend.

Opposing Turkey

The "Eurofest" gathering, focusing on opposition to Turkey’s proposed accession to the European Union, was to bring together groups from Germany, Italy, Romania and Spain in the town of Meligalas, southern Greece.

In the wake of protests from Greek Jewish and left-wing organisations, and the threat of a government ban, the organisers said they would change the location of the three-day event but released no information on where it might be held.

The site of a bloody confrontation between Communist and right-wing forces in September 1944, shortly before the liberation of Greece from Nazi occupation, Meligalas already hosts an annual commemoration by extreme right-wing groups from Greece and Europe.

Chryssi Avgi’s newspaper on Thursday made no mention of the "Eurofest", beyond noting that the militants would gather at Meligalas on Sunday for their annual commemoration.