France Cracks down on Anti-NATO Protest

[Mike Morin]

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/europe/2009/04/2009432065518888.html


Mike Morin
Peoples Equity Union

[Bitter Ashes]

Here's the article's content :)

France cracks down on Nato protests

French police have cut off public transport to a campsite outside of Strasbourg housing thousands of anti-Nato demonstrators in a bid to ensure the military alliance's two-day summit is trouble-free.
Protesters have said they will defy police restrictions and attempt to leave the camp site on Saturday to hold peaceful protests in town.
"We do not want any clashes with police ... We will go around them, we will go through them. We will not attack them. But we will make our way," Christoph Kleine, a spokesman for the Block Nato movement, said.
France and Germany, which are co-hosting the summit, have each deployed 15,000 police and troops in an operation costing 110 million euros ahead of the conference which marks the 28-member military alliance's 60th anniversary.
Demonstrators from as far afield as Japan have flocked to a "counter-summit" in Strasbourg to campaign against war, defence spending and nuclear weapons, but Strasbourg's streets were virtually deserted on Friday as unauthorised traffic was forbidden in many parts of the city.

Protesters injured
Rainbow flags saying "Peace" fluttered from windows on the outskirts of the French city, but all signs of protest had been erased from the central streets and squares, a Reuters news agency report said.
Schools and the university were closed and most businesses and restaurants have shut down for the duration of the summit.
But outside the city, police used teargas and water cannons to force back hundreds of anti-Nato protesters and two people were injured when youths let off fireworks in response to police spraying them with water, French television said.


The clashes occurred shortly after Barack Obama, the US president, addressed a US-style "town hall meeting" in the centre of Strasbourg, before leaving by helicopter for the summit's opening session in Baden-Baden in Germany.

'Like serious criminals'
Protesters at the campsite, who say they plan peaceful protests, have criticised the police tactics.
"We have been treated like serious criminals," said a German student at the campsite.
"We were searched American-style with our hands on the car, but we are going to stay calm and we are not going to hit back."
Tensions were high after police arrested about 300 people and wounded one man with a rubber bullet in clashes on Thursday. Many of those detained were later freed.
Some protesters said they were frustrated by the large police presence in Strasbourg and across the Rhine river in the German cities of Kehl and Baden-Baden, where Obama and Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor, met for the summit's opening session.
Over 20 protesters were detained, including a 22-year-old man, who police said had breached a ban on wearing face masks.
He was later freed.
Two German protesters will be prosecuted for illegally carrying arms, police there said.

[Mike Morin]

Two arrested for illegally carrying arms.

In the USA, IN THEORY, that would be against their Constitutional rights!!!


Mike Morin
www.peoplesequityunion.blogspot.com (http://www.peoplesequityunion.blogspot.com)

[Bitter Ashes]

I thought it was only in certain states that you could apply for a permit to bear concealed arms in a public place in the States, like Washington DC.
The UK outlaws weapons outright. Several years in jail for merely having anything that could be used as a weapon in a public place without a very good reason, even a rock. A lot of other weapons you can be arrested for too even if they do not ever leave your house.
The thing about the masks concerns me too.

[brigadista]

check this out

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7888301.stm (http://www.anonym.to/?http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7888301.stm)

[Stranger Than Paradise]

check this out

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7888301.stm (http://www.anonym.to/?http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7888301.stm)

That's crazy.

[jbaez]

That is incredibly ridiculous. Since when does taking pictures constitute a fine or prison sentence? (referring to the BBC link)

[Jeoh]

That is incredibly ridiculous. Since when does taking pictures constitute a fine or prison sentence? (referring to the BBC link)

February 16th, I guess. :lol:

[Mike Morin]

That is incredibly ridiculous. Since when does taking pictures constitute a fine or prison sentence? (referring to the BBC link)

You've never heard of CIA "Covert Operations"?

Read Perkins's book, "Confessions of an Economic Hit Man".


Mike Morin
Peoples Equity Union