Hungarian police on Tuesday braced for further violence a day after Budapest was rocked by anti-government riots on the 50th anniversary of the uprising against Soviet rule.
"We are prepared for a return to violence and can guarantee law and order," national police spokesman Tibor Jarmy told AFP.
He said police reinforcements from the countryside would stay in the capital "for the time being."
Outside parliament, where dozens of heads of state commemorated the uprising on Monday, an area where far-right extremists had held protests for over a month remained cordoned off.
"We still consider this an area for police operations," Jarmy said.
Police fired rubber bullets, tear gas and water cannons at thousands of mostly far-right protestors on the streets Budapest on Monday, as commemorations of the uprising descended into chaos.
The government reported 167 injured including 17 police officers, and 131 arrests. "An aggressive minority is terrorising us. We have to defend the country," Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsany told public television late on Monday after an emergency session of the security cabinet.
There were fears the riots could bring a return of the chaos triggered in mid-September by a leaked recording in which Gyurcsany said he had lied to voters to win re-election in April.
Those protests, which lasted over a month, degenerated into riots over three nights, leaving hundreds injured.
The leader of the main right-wing opposition Fidesz party, former prime minister Viktor Orban, used the recording to compare Gyurcsany to Soviet oppressors, saying both had "lied" to the country.
On Monday he told tens of thousands of supporters that "an entire country has turned against this illegitimate government."
But in an impassioned speech to parliament on Tuesday, Gyurcsany struck back, accusing Orban of fuelling far-right protests and failing to condemn radicals.
"Radical words result in radical deeds. The leader of the opposition gave an ideology to troublemakers on the streets. The link is obvious," Gyurcsany said.
Fidesz, instead of condemning the rioters, defended them on Monday, saying police had used "brutal and inexplicable force".
Gabor Kuncze, president of the junior coalition Free Democrats party, also questioned the presence at Fidesz rallies of extremists waving the red-and-white-striped "Arpad" flag used by Hungary's pro-Nazi government during World War II. "Why does (Fidesz) not say during its rallies that these flags have no place there, that those protestors should get the hell out of there? What we see is not only the responsibility of Fidesz but the tactics of Fidesz," Kuncze said in parliament.
Fidesz has for years refused to commemorate the anti-Soviet uprising with the Socialists, saying they are the direct successors of the Communists who colluded with the Soviets in 1956. The uprising broke out on October 23, 1956 and was crushed by Soviet tanks two weeks later, sealing the country's fate as a satellite state of Moscow until the fall of communism in 1989.
Orban said on Monday he wanted to hold referendums on the government's economic reforms.
"The government can continue in power but the riots dent its credibility. Gyurcsany will need very convincing policies and very convincing ministers in order to stay in power," said Peter Balazs, a political science professor at Central European University.
Gyurcsany's reforms are unpopular because they include austerity measures aimed at reining in Hungary's public deficit, the highest in the European Union, and preparing the country to adopt the euro.