MONTREAL: At least 25 people were arrested yesterday after hundreds took to Montreal's streets, protesting against plans to raise tuition fees and Canada's hosting of the Formula One Grand Prix.

The march began peacefully, with some of the 500 protesters banging pots and pans and some wearing carnival masks.

But when the marchers neared Crescent Street and its Formula One stands, they were blocked by police who used tear gas to disperse the crowd. Pepper spray was also used as the crowd, jeered, booed and cursed.

Three police cars with broken windows and covered with graffiti were seen. Montreal police said more arrests could follow.

An AFP correspondent saw a young man dressed in black handcuffed by police and subjected to a body search.

For four months, students in Quebec, along with anti-capitalist and feminist groups have held protests against government plans to increase tuition fees by 75 percent.

Students see yesterday's Grand Prix race as an "elitist event." But they also want to take advantage of the media presence and international visitors to publicize their fight against proposed tuition hikes.

However, La Classe, the student union considered to be the most radical, reiterated it had no intention of disrupting the Grand Prix.

Negotiations between student groups and the province have broken down, and the protest movement have since morphed into a larger campaign of perceived government corruption, mismanagement and injustice.

"We are in a real social crisis in Quebec. And at the moment we are witnessing police brutality, for no purpose, really," Zac Daoust Lefebvre, a student at the University of Montreal told AFP.

"The street belongs to us. The police has no business being here," said an exasperated university professor who identified himself as Francois but declined to give a last name.

The professor said he did not care about the Grand Prix, but he showed up at Crescent Street to protest against tuition hikes and a new law, Bill 178, that sets tough restrictions — including arrests and hefty fines — on demonstrators.