A police operation within the Athens Polytechnic early Friday afternoon resulted in the arrest of 24 people, part of a larger group of would-be demonstrators that entered the central Athens campus ahead of the annual commemoration of a 1973 students' uprising against a junta then ruling Greece.
The evacuation of the mostly youthful protesters, however, and on a university campus, no less, is due to an ongoing coronavirus-related lockdown in the country, which includes a 9 p.m. to 5 a.m. curfew for practically all outdoor movement.
A similar operation took place at the main university campus in the Zografou district.
The development was noteworthy because Greek law enforcement has rarely intervened on university campuses, mainly due to a once strict "university asylum" status granted to such grounds.
