ATHENS - GREECE'S president was fitted with a pacemaker on Monday on the 10th day of civil unrest by Athens protesters as a landswap scandal returned to haunt its troubled right-wing government.

Mr Karolos Papoulias, 79, underwent his operation as riot squads ringed Athens police headquarters following demonstrations marking appearances before magistrates for six militants among 86 arrested over weekend violence.

An ex-socialist foreign minister and track athlete in his youth, Mr Papoulias was said by doctors to be 'in perfect condition', according to a hospital statement carried by the Athens News Agency.

While evening rallies got underway, and week-long protests were announced, demonstrators admitted a fear of their mobilisation 'deflating' for the first time since the police killing of a teenager triggered widespread unrest.

Greek tourism leaders, meanwhile, said a strike over wages by staff at the Acropolis was more damaging to their industry - with the global economic downturn posing the greatest threat for sales of summer packages.

'Let's be clear, the country is not in the grip of terrorists - so far there has been neither victims nor violence against people,' Mr Argyro Philli, the head of the Greek travel agents association, told AFP.

Prime Minister Costas Karamanlis - who holds the real power - went to Cyprus for a funeral as more than 1,000 youths descended on police headquarters with traffic, public buildings and state radio disrupted in several cities.

Few clashes involved firebombing and tear gas - the cocktail of choice for Athens radicals - the main one coming outside the prison where two officers await trial over the Dec 6 killing of Alexis Grigoropoulos, 15.

In Larissa, youths were met with tear gas as they hurled stones at the central city's main police station after four protesters were bound over facing fire-raising charges. The group retreated to the occupied medical school.

After one Sunday poll showed majority public support for a 'popular uprising' against Mr Karamanlis' administration, protests were also mounted in Thessaloniki, Patras, Ioannina and on the island of Lesbos.

Greece's education system remains beset by student occupations and mass truancy with just a handful of teaching days left before Christmas, while in a sign of enduring anger, banks were targeted in the central town of Volos.

'There's real class hate around, particularly when you see people carrying five bags of shopping, not caring about others who starve,' said 29-year-old protester Zachi as well-to-do Athenians exited nearby boutiques.

But as the sprawling mound of candles, football scarves, cigarettes and other mementoes rose up at the shrine where Grigoropoulos fell, protesters also injected a note of black humour into their movement.

AFP witnessed demonstrators shoving a water pistol into the face of a riot policeman or - in the case of one passing elderly woman - sheltering from a hail of tangerines and tomatoes aimed at security forces, under an umbrella.

Meanwhile, initial findings from ongoing parliamentary inquiries into shady deals with an Orthodox monastery found fault with government conduct going back 10 years to the previous socialist administration.

Two members of Mr Karamanlis's government quit over the disposal of valuable state land that lost Greek taxpayers millions of euros. Opposition groupings did not endorse the findings, with their recommendations to follow.

Despite the troubles at home, Mr Karamanlis - who has steadfastly rejected calls to quit - went ahead with a planned visit for the funeral of former Cypriot president Tassos Papadopoulos, who died of cancer on Friday. -- AFP