Photographs: Dinuka Liyanawatte/Reuters
Hundreds of supporters of the ousted president Mohamed Nasheed gathered outside the Majlis for a second time in the day on Sunday raising slogans against the current regime of Mohammed Waheed Hassan.
The protesters assembled outside the Majlis (parliament) an hour after the riot police dispersed them from the venue where as per the Maldivian's law no protest march is allowed.
Earlier, protesters numbering around 400 along with 15 MPs of Nasheed's Maldivian Democratic Party gathered outside the Majlis after a lull of over two days since the protests that began after Nasheed's resignation on Tuesday.
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Nasheed supporters clash with police in Maldives
Image: Maldivian police officers walk past the Maldives parliament during a protest, in Male, on Sunday nightPhotographs: Dinuka Liyanawatte/Reuters
Over 150 anti-riot police personnel armed with batons and pepper spray pushed the protesters back after over an hour of standoff with them.
Shouting slogans against the current president, the protesters threw money at the police. A few water bottles were also thrown at the police who set up barricades on the street leading to Majlis to stop protesters.
About half a dozen protesters were detained.
Nasheed supporters clash with police in Maldives
Image: A supporter Mohamed Nasheed shouts slogans in front of a police officer as he holds a placard during a protest in MalePhotographs: Dinuka Liyanawatte/Reuters
"We have been keeping much restrain. We just want this area to be cleared as protests are not allowed on the street," a senior police official told PTI.
The protests comes on the day when new President Hassan inducted seven members into his expanded cabinet, including the country's first woman attorney general and an aide of former dictator Maumoon Abdul Gayoom.
A European Union team from Colombo is expected to land in Male soon to take stock of the situation.
Maldives' first democratically-elected president had said that he was forced to resign as gun-wielding military men threatened that they would resort to using arms if he did not.
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