Budapest, Hungary ? Protesters clashed with police and stormed the headquarters of state television early today, responding with violence to a leaked recording that caught Hungary’s prime minister admitting the government “lied morning, evening and night” about the economy.

Rescue services said at least 50 people were injured as police fired tear gas and water cannon at rock-throwing protesters, who have been demanding the government resign.

The violence followed a mainly peaceful demonstration that began a day earlier outside parliament, after a recording made in May was leaked to local media. On it, Socialist Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsany admitted officials lied about government finances to win April’s elections.

Despite the surge in violence involving dozens of the protesters, Gyurcsany said that he had no plans to resign.

“The street is not a solution, but instead causes conflict and crisis,” the prime minister told MTI, the state news service. “Our job is to resolve the conflict and prevent a crisis.”

As the crowd grew Monday night to more than 10,000, according to an estimate by MTI, several hundred broke away and marched over to the nearby headquarters of state television, demanding to deliver a statement in a live broadcast. While most of demonstrators watched, a few dozen broke through police lines and into the TV headquarters.

Right-wing demonstrators storm the headquarters of the Hungarian State Television early today during an escalating protest against Hungary's socialist government in Budapest. The protest started on Sunday evening calling for Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsany to resign. Gyurcsany has admitted saying that his party lied to the public to win April's general election.

Police tried to disperse them with water cannon sprays but the truck was quickly disabled by the rioters, some of whom escorted the police officers operating the vehicle to safety. Several cars near the TV building were set on fire, their flames scorching the building.

The tape was made at a closed-door meeting in late May, weeks after Gyurcsany’s government became the first in post-communist Hungary to win re-election.

It seemed to confirm the worst accusations leveled at him by the center-right opposition during the campaign – that Hungary’s state budget was on the verge of collapse and that Gyurcsany and his ministers were concealing the truth to secure victory.

Adding spice to the scandal, Gyurcsany’s comments were full of crude remarks and called into doubt the abilities of some of Hungary’s most respected economic experts.

“We screwed up. Not a little, a lot,” Gyurcsany was heard saying. “No European country has done something as boneheaded as we have.”

The prime minister also told colleagues the government needed to end its duplicitous ways. “I almost died when for a year and a half we had to pretend we were governing. Instead, we lied morning, evening and night. I don’t want to do this anymore,” he told his fellow Socialists.

The 45-year-old Gyurcsany, his party’s golden boy since he was elected prime minister in late 2002, said the economy had been kept afloat only through “divine providence, the abundance of cash in the world economy and hundreds of tricks.”