Protesters break up BNP event

By Adrian Croft

LONDON (Reuters) - Scores of protesters throwing eggs and shouting "Nazi scum, off our streets" broke up a news conference on Tuesday by the British National Party which has just won its first seats in the European Parliament.

BNP leader Nick Griffin and Andrew Brons, who both won European Parliament seats in the north of England in last week's vote, had just started giving an open-air news conference outside parliament when they were charged by protesters.

They threw eggs which broke on Griffin's shoulder and at least one protester hit him with the stick of a placard, a Reuters photographer on the scene said.

Chased by the protesters, Griffin and Brons fled in waiting cars. Demonstrators struck the cars with placards, which bore the slogan "Stop the Fascist BNP," as they accelerated away.

A police spokeswoman said two people had been taken to hospital after the protest, but she had no more information about them or their injuries.

Police were looking into an allegation of assault on a woman at the protest and investigating reports of a road collision linked to the demonstration, she said. No one had been arrested.

Police guarding parliament did not intervene in the protest.

The BNP, which campaigns for a halt to immigration, voluntary repatriation of immigrants and British withdrawal from the European Union, has won local council seats but is not represented in the British parliament.