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Roundup: 4 Italian police injured in clashes at Austrian border

Xinhua, May 8, 2016 Adjust font size:

Four Italian police were injured and 18 slightly hurt on Saturday during clashes with groups of violent protesters against Austria-proposed closure of the border between the two countries, the Italian press reported.

Pictures published by local newspapers on Sunday showed Italian police firing teargas at protesters estimated to be around 500, and coming from various parts of Italy and northern Europe. Five of them, with masked faces and throwing firecrackers and other objects, were reportedly arrested by police.

A group of protesters invaded nearby railway tracks, while another group reached a highway, and temporarily blocked traffic. According to Milan-based newspaper Corriere della Sera, the protest was organized by an anarchist group from the northern region of Trentino Alto Adige.

Austrian police officers were also deployed, but did not intervene since the protest took place exclusively on the Italian side of the border. Part of Europe's borderless Schengen zone, the Brenner Pass at the border between the two countries is one of the routes used by migrants to enter Europe.

Austria had recently announced a plan to erect a fence at the border with Italy to limit the flows, and Saturday's protest came on the same day that European Commission (EC) President Jean-Claude Juncker called Vienna's plan "a political catastrophe."

Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi said on Thursday after meeting German Chancellor Angela Merkel in Rome that the two countries are utterly opposed to the Austrian plan as a response to the migration crisis. Endit