Poland's gays are campaigning against discrimination

The marchers carried rainbow flags and banners with slogans including "A gay is not a paedophile" and "Law and justice for all".

There were isolated clashes as opponents threw eggs and shouted insults. About 10 people were arrested.

Mayor Lech Kaczynski, favourite to win October's presidential vote, had banned the parade for a second year running.

The marchers were joined by a number of politicians, including Deputy Prime Minister Izabela Jaruga-Nowacka and two German MPs from the Green Party, Claudia Roth and Volkar Beck.

"Mayor Kaczynski, democracy also means freedom of assembly and expression for gays and lesbians," Ms Roth told the crowd.

The organisers of the parade said they wanted to highlight the problems faced by homosexuals in mainly Roman Catholic Poland.

"Homosexuals in Poland are still treated as deviants, paedophiles," one of the marchers, 31-year-old lawyer Paulina Pilch, told AP news agency.

"Such demonstrations are needed so people get to know us better and get used to us."

Mr Kaczynski has said that allowing an official Gay Pride event in Warsaw would promote a "homosexual lifestyle".

He banned the parade on the grounds that the application by the parade organisers had not been properly filed.