Greeks bury shot teenager

By Michele Kambas

ATHENS (Reuters) - In a somber atmosphere crackling with tension, thousands of Greeks followed a small white coffin to Alexandros Grigoropoulos' last resting place in an Athens graveyard on Tuesday.

Mourners sobbed and relatives supported Grigoropoulos' distraught mother and sister as the 15-year-old's coffin was carried by friends through a maze of white marble graves to a family tomb.

Tearful teenagers scattered white and pink roses into his grave. All the while, the violence unleashed by the boy's death flared just two blocks away.

Grigoropoulos' shooting by police on Saturday has ignited the worst civil unrest in decades, striking a nerve among thousands of Greeks jaded by years of economic hardship and government scandals.

Dozens of youths, angry at the presence of riot police near the cemetery, pelted them with stones and the officers responded with teargas.

"Cops, pigs, murderers," some of the demonstrators cried as the Orthodox liturgy continued.

Since the shooting, riots have spread like wildfire through Greece, posing a formidable challenge to conservative government hanging on to a parliamentary majority by a whisker.

Some 5,000 black-clad mourners packed the sprawling Palio Faliro cemetery in southern Athens. Some sat or stood on its tall walls. Hundreds more spilled out into the street.

Neighborhood shops were shut, their shutters rolled down and draped with black mourning cloth. Hundreds of businesses have been damaged in a four-day rampage by demonstrators across the country.

"They killed a kid and we are worried about a couple of shops that were torched. It's crazy," said a 20-year-old law student, who declined to give his name.

One policeman has been charged with murder over Grigoropoulos' shooting. Police said the officer fired three warning shots after his car was attacked by 30 youths on Saturday but witnesses said he took aim.

"How could anyone do this to a child? Where will this stop?" said 62-year-old housewife Maria Kanellou.

The crowd was largely peaceful, but mourners did not need much of an emotional trigger.

News that riot police were in the neighborhood saw groups of teenagers, several donning face masks, take to the street to meet them head on.

Within minutes, two dumpsters were ablaze and police were lobbing teargas into a narrow side street, the bangs from the teargas drowning out the funeral liturgy of the Orthodox priest.