Linz clashes: Football supporters in mass brawl with refugees in Austria

Police make arrests as tensions spill over into street brawl on Saturday night

On track: a tram rolls through the city centre

Football supporters have clashed with refugees in street brawls in the Austrian city of Linz.

Police said fighting broke out in the early hours of Sunday between a gang of football supporters from Linzer-Athletik-Sport-Klub, known as LASK, and a group of Syrian and Afghan refugees.

Some 20 men were involved in the violence, according to the Austrian edition of The Local, with two separate incidents at around 1am and 2.30am.

Officers had to dispatch several units to bring the situation under control. Two men have subsequently been arrested.

The cause of this latest outbreak of violence remains unclear.

However, tensions between asylum seekers and residents have been running high in the city with the station dubbed the “terminus of fear” as it has become a focal point for migrants turned away from Germany.

Linz University experts claim up to 30 per cent of the 1.1 million asylum seekers who came to Germany in 2015 are now in the Austrian city.

It comes as Austria has seen a resurgence in far-right politics with Norbert Hofer of the Freedom Party, a movement founded by a former Nazi SS guard, now in the running to be the country’s president in elections next month.