ANKARA More than 110 people were injured Wednesday as protests in central Ankara against the government's handling of Turkey's severe economic crisis turned into the most violent yet.

At one stage police fired shots into the air when thousands of traders burned placards and hurled stones and metal objects at them, AFP said.

Initial reports said 48 police and 67 civilians were injured, none of them seriously.

The violence erupted when several groups from an estimated 70,000 protesters, rallying in a central Ankara square, attempted to break through a police barricade set up to confine the protests to a specific area.

Security forces, dressed in riot gear, formed a human wall in front of the protesters, and came under a hail of stones, sticks and metal objects, prompting them to respond with truncheons and tear gas canisters, and water cannon from armored vehicles deployed nearby.

An AFP photographer was among those injured.

'Down With the Government,' 'No to Poverty and Corruption,' and 'Open Your Eyes Turkey,' chanted the protesters as 50 soldiers armed with machine guns watched from a few meters away and police helicopters overflew the scene.

Scuffles also broke out between protesters themselves as several groups ignored appeals by rally organizers, the Ankara Chamber of Tradesmen, to observe order, NTV news channel reported.

As police managed to disperse demonstrators from the square, the angry crowd marched toward the Ulus District, a main commercial area in the city, and continued to hurl sticks and stones at police.

Security forces then fired warning shots in the air.

Meanwhile another 40,000 people gathered in the city of Izmir, calling on the government to resign and for tax payments to be postponed.

Truncheon-wielding police also detained two demonstrators in the Mediterranean city of Mersin, where some 50,000 people marched.

Massive demonstrations have been sweeping Turkey since last week, reflecting growing public frustration with the government's handling of economic turmoil in the country.

Turkey's Chamber of Commerce on Tuesday called on the government to take responsibility for the country's serious financial woes and resign.

But Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit made clear Wednesday neither he nor his government would resign. However he did not rule out a cabinet reshuffle, Anatolian News Agency reported.

He told Parliament: "I believe that presently the search for a new government could open the door to a government crisis. That is why I am staying on duty, and I will stay."

Ankara was forced to float the Turkish lira on February 22 in the face of a financial shake-up, triggered by fears of political instability following an unprecedented public row between Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit and President Ahmet Necdet Sezer over ways to fight corruption.

The currency has so far lost some 40 percent of its value against the dollar, pushing prices up.

The government has pledged to announce a reform plan by mid-April.

Meanwhile, another report from Turkey said that two women inmates died Wednesday in a hunger strike against prison reforms which has already claimed four lives.

The Turkish Human Rights Association said some 120 prisoners on hunger strike have been hospitalized and a dozen are in critical condition from the protest fast.

Between 300 and 400 inmates are on a hunger strike while more than 1,650 are taking part in a rotating hunger strike, the rights group said.

The hunger strikes were launched to protest Turkey's plans to introduce new prisons with smaller cells for up to three inmates, replacing existing jails with large dormitories.

In December, Turkish paramilitary troops carried out nationwide raids on scores of jails across the country to break the hunger strike. The four-day crackdown left 30 prisoners dead, many of them by self-immolation. Two soldiers also died.