Sounds like there was quite a rumble at the G-8 protests on Saturday. Here's a minute-long video from El Mundo: Violentos enfrentamientos en la marcha contra el G-8 06/02/07. The formal meeting doesn't start until June 6.This article reports 146 police injured on the first day, 25 seriously: El primer día de protestas contra la cumbre del G-8 en Alemania deja 146 policías heridos El Mundo/EFE 06/02/07. No word included on how many demonstrators may have been injured.Der Spiegel has more photos: Rostock: Steine, Stinkefinger, brennende Autos.
And they're reporting more than 300 or more police injured: Randale in Rostock - 300 verletzte Polizisten. These initial reports are blaming "Autonomen", or "autonomous" groups - anarchists, more-or-less. It's worth noting that in this article, reporting prior to the riot, that the German police union was criticizing US demands on security measures, particularly the notion that protesters should be completely out of sight of the G-8 participants: Polizeigewerkschaft kritisiert US-Sicherheitsvorgaben Der Spiegel 02.06.07. Bush doesn't want to see the demonstrators, hear them, or think about them. The police union chairperson said, "Es ist mir eine Herzensangelegenheit, dass Menschen demonstrieren dürfen, dass der Protest deutlich sichtbar ist. Das ist wichtig für unsere Demokratie." ("It is my heart's desire that people be allowed to demonstrate, [and] that the protest is clearly visible. That is important for our democracy.")
For the demonstrators to initiate violence at these things is pointless, especially if the police themselves are demanding greater freedom for peaceful demonstrators. I haven't seen any credible reports yet on provocateurs in this case. But given everything we know about how the Cheney-Bush administration handles things, the chances of them sending in provocateurs is something around 100%, I would guess.
Tags: g-8 summit
3 comments:
Provocateurs, yeah.
Speaking of which, do you have any thoughts on the potential for right wing violence in the wake of a Democratic sweep in '08? Digby and Orcinus are on the case.
I look back to Salt Lake City in '94. (For me, that is *not* ancient history.) Living in the West, I was aware that violent extremists had long been robbing banks and murdering deputies and settling their disputes with pipe bombs - the kind of low-level background terrorism that nobody pays any attention. In the wake of the Rodney King riots a good number of people fled LA and moved to the northern suburb of Salt Valley. That was good, in that one could suddenly find decent coffee and interesting beer in the local shops, but it was dangerous in that the locals lost control of the Republican Party to the deluge of California moderates. A backlash ensued, with some nasty political infighting. An atmosphere of paranoia settled over the town and I was seriously concerned that violence might break out - and be turned against the despised liberals, who both sides agreed were less than dirt.
Fortunately, it never came to that - but this was in the era of the Gingrich coup that swept the Republicans into control of Congress. If the background had been THE DIRTY FUCKING HIPPIES ARE TAKING OVER!!!!11! events might well have gone differently.
Anyway, that's my story and I'm sticking with it.
Hilsen, Alain
It occurs to me, that my opening remark in the previous comment could easily be misunderestimated as "yeah, right." In fact my intent was to say "yeah, that's what they do." Owls eat mice, so what do you expect?
Alain, it's hard to predict these things. But we did see a big rise in far-right/Christian-terrorist violence during the Clinton administration. I think we could likely to see something like that in a new Democratic administration.
Also, under the current administration's anti-terrorism guidelines, far-right groups seem to be getting a low priority. That also doesn't help.
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