• Updated February 20, 2013, 10:38 a.m. ET

General Strike Hits Greece

By PHILIP PANGALOS and NEKTARIA STAMOULI

ATHENS—Tens of thousands of demonstrators took to the streets of the Greek capital Wednesday as the country's two biggest unions staged a 24-hour general strike to protest record unemployment and continuing austerity measures the government has promised its international creditors.

In what was a largely peaceful but loud demonstration in Athens, some of the protesters banged drums, while others chanted slogans and held banners opposing the austerity policies prescribed by the European Union and the International Monetary Fund for the country to remain inside the euro zone.

One banner held by protesters in front of Parliament read: "No to the euro."

Agence France-Presse/Getty Images

A member of a Greek Communist trade union shouts slogans during a demonstration in Athens on Wednesday against austerity measures.

According to police estimates, more than 40,000 demonstrators converged on the Greek Parliament in the center of the city from three separate marches, while protest organizers said there were more than 50,000 taking part. Separate protests were held in several other cities around the country, including Thessaloniki in northern Greece and the western port of Patras, as well as on the island of Crete.

Amid a strong police presence aimed at preventing the violence that has frequently marred past protests, there were only minor incidents and, unusually, no arrests or detentions.

The nationwide strike, called by private-sector umbrella union GSEE and its public-sector counterpart, Adedy, paralyzed public services, shutting central and local government offices, courts, tax offices, state-controlled banks, schools and universities countrywide, while hospitals were operating on skeleton staff. Buses in the Greek capital offered partial services, while suburban and overland train services also were disrupted. Two, four-hour work stoppages by civil aviation workers likewise forced the disruption of flight schedules into and out of the Athens airport.

"As long as the dead-end and destructive policies being enforced by the government under the instructions of the troika continue, working people are obliged to gather all their strengths and struggle," said GSEE president Yiannis Panagopoulos. "They have destroyed a whole people. What we are asking for here and now is for these policies to change."

The latest general strike is the 30th in Greece since the economic crisis began three years ago. Since then, Greece has implemented successive waves of austerity measures in exchange for a 173 billion ($231.63 billion) bailout from the country's euro-zone partners and the IMF.

But the austerity measures also have weighed heavily on the economy, now entering its sixth straight year of recession, and has contracted by nearly a quarter since its peak six years ago. The unemployment rate is the highest in Europe, hitting a record 27% in November, while the jobless rate for those aged 15-24 has hit a staggering 61.7% and there are concerns that it is set to go higher.

The austerity measures also have been accompanied by a series of overhauls that include a weakening of collective wage agreements and steps toward laying off public-sector workers.

"We are here demonstrating today because merchants and small businesses are suffering more than salaried workers," said Giorgos Kavathas, vice president of the Hellenic Confederation of Professionals, Craftsmen and Merchants, which also took part in the protest march in central Athens under a banner saying, "Put a padlock on the eradication of businesses."

According to the group, more than a 100,000 small businesses have gone bankrupt in the past 2 years. "I am not optimistic; 2013 will be the worst year of the crisis and the effects of six years of accumulated recession will take a very long time to bring back recovery," Mr. Kavathas added.

Kyriakos, a 62-year-old self-employed clothing salesman who declined to give his surname, said his small business was suffocating because of the recession and austerity measures that have cut into salaries and pensions. "People just don't have any money to spend; our customers are poor and they don't have any money to spend. There are 1.5 million unemployed and they should all be here on the streets to protest at this unbearable situation. They have made us all poor," he said.

Write to Philip Pangalos at philip.pangalos@dowjones.com and Nektaria Stamouli at nektaria.stamouli@dowjones.com