On the evening of 9 March 2021, clashes broke out between protesters and police officers in the southern Nea Smyrni suburb of the capital Athens during a march organized to protest an incident of police brutality. A group of demonstrators threw rocks and Molotov cocktails at a police station and assaulted an officer riding a motorcycle. Police officers deployed tear gas, stun grenades and water cannons to disperse the crowd. Five police officers were injured in the violence, and authorities arrested 16 people. More than 5,000 people, mostly youths, participated in the march to denounce police brutality after a video filmed on 7 March — which shows police officers assaulting a man in the Nea Smyrni area — circulated on social media platforms.