(long posting) Guardian archive articles on global piracy, Genoa, and th

Comment 
Bush's global piracy can be the spur for Europe's cause 
Faced with a reckless brigand, European disunity is a disgrace

Special report: European integration 
Polly Toynbee
Guardian 
Wednesday July 18, 2001 
Yesterday the latest Eurobarometer poll found that only 48% of the EU's
citizens think EU membership is "a good thing". Election turnouts fall, the
Irish vote No to enlargement and the young riot at Gothenburg. What is to be
done? Europe's foreign ministers meeting this week were stumped. "Only
reconnect", they kept saying with no idea how people and politics might be
put back together. 
At the meeting Jack Straw's bumbling attempt at finding a European purpose
would be funny if it weren't so embarrassing. "Remember the war" was his
message. The young have forgotten why hard-won European unity is so
precious. He suggested reruns of Dad's Army and Saving Private Ryan. The
problem in Britain is that we can't forget the war, we are uniquely fixated.
No, the "Never Again" idealism that founded the EU stirs little passion now.
Why should it? It was over 55 years ago and even the cold war is just a GCSE
topic to my children. Europe needs a better purpose than that. 
Today that purpose lands in Britain in the undistinguished form of President
George Bush. Tomorrow he lunches with the Queen and dines with the prime
minister at Chequers before the G8 summit in Genoa, where more riots are
expected. If EU leaders are rattled by the sense that the union is crumbling
from within, let them gaze upon their possible saviour. For the sight of
George Bush should give Europe new faith in itself and a renewed mission.
Europe is not America. The west, in the post-cold war world, is a barely
meaningful idea: no thread runs from Texas to Toulouse and Tubingen. While
the EU fiddles with lawnmower regulations, grumbling mildly about one
another's selfishness, it forgets the big picture. George Bush is the big
picture. He reminds Europe that it does have a remarkably coherent set of
values. Little by little, far too gingerly, it is starting to feel its way
towards taking more responsibility for the future of the world - but too
timidly. 
President Bush as global vandal arrives in Europe as the cartoon oilman
belching out carbon fumes, refusing to sign up to Kyoto, drilling on in
Alaska and now refusing even to join the rest of G8 in providing the 2bn
poorest people in the world with renewable electricity. His insouciant
super-power selfishness is quite incomprehensible to Europeans. The White
House briefing on climate change for this trip came from some other planet:
just $50m to be spent over three years for research into carbon cycles on
the very day $100m was spent on a missile test (now to become a monthly
money-burner, with over $8bn earmarked for NMD in just one year). 
No sooner had the US interceptor struck mid-air gold, than China and Russia
were embracing in a somewhat over-staged bearhug on Monday, the first since
Stalin and Mao. This was a warning of sorts. Europe watches aghast while
Bush the treaty-wrecker threatens to break international law if he proceeds
unilaterally to abrogate the 1972 ABM treaty. 
These are two issues EU citizens understand very well - with anger and zero
understanding of modern American politics, as inscrutable as China. This is
a chance for the EU to forge a united front against a savage administration,
appealing over its head to Americans (Bush's support has fallen 10%
already). On both these issues the EU has a chance to prove its raison
d'etre to its own people with a clear European riposte to US global piracy. 
On Kyoto Europe is doing well and should shout louder. It will press on with
its own carbon reduction targets, encouraging others, despite the great
global glutton. Margaret Beckett goes to the summit with a better British
reduction target. Waiting on Japan and Canada, if just enough countries sign
up, then an international trade in carbon emissions might eventually grow
into a profitable business a future US administration could choose to join.
The planet cannot easily be saved without America, but the EU has a chance
to press ahead, knowing that much US public opinion can be swung in future
elections. 
NMD is a trickier question. EU states make their own calculations on their
relations with the US, though none genuinely believe in this as a rogue
state remedy. Leave aside British delusions about special relationships or
Atlantic bridges, each country has its own historic agenda. Within the year
Tony Blair will have to give his response to upgrading Menwith Hill and
Fylingdales (those US listening posts that can't hear a bunch of Greenpeace
protesters creeping up on them). But Europe has to reject any US project
that fails to proceed by treaty with Russia: Putin may or may not have his
price. An explosion of protest across the EU will remind leaders that the
citizens are not apathetic after all. 
With Europe spending 60% of the US on defence but getting just 10% bang for
its bucks, its useless capability was laid bare in Kosovo. Even when it
builds the Eurofighter, each country still has its own expensive air vice
marshals and training systems. Drawing it all into an effective force means
less reliance on America. Meanwhile, the European mission to North Korea
showed the other way to lessen dangers from rogue states. Americans are
quick to say we should pay our own way whenever Europe grows too critical
and they are right. We can't have it both ways - whingeing but dependent.
However, old corkscrew diplomatic thinking is still deep in cold war
dependency on America. Letting go of the past is a prerequisite for a new
European identity. Since Britain is one of the worst, taking a lead would be
a gesture of substance. Start by handing our UN security council seat to the
EU: France might someday follow. 
Gut anti-Americanism runs deep not just in France, but in the European left,
among new anti-globalisers, with remnants of old cultural snobbery about
ugly American vulgarity. With the new right - Berlusconi, Tory eurosceptics
- looking to the US for inspiration, how tempting for Europe's overwhelming
social democratic majority to become Americaphobes in response. After all, a
good enemy would help shape European identity, but that is too extreme.
Europe needs independence and strength. It needs to square up to the US and
offer another democratic model, an alternative to the American way. It is a
bid to carry more weight and to inspire Americans to elect progressive
leaders, not to turn them into enemies. 
However, right now faced with a reckless brigand in command of the only
super-power, Europe's disunited weakness looks increasingly disgraceful. So
rich together yet failing to offer a counter-balance to the US. That is the
big idea - but it will need big advocates to inspire Europe's citizens. So
far Jack Straw says he wants no big thinking, just modest consolidation -
hardly a call to enthuse people to a European idea they are losing. 
p.toynbee@guardian.co.uk 

01Aug2001 UK: Reform or else. 
Blair's call for EU reforms stirs euro debate

Tony Blair's speech in Brazil about the future of Europe has subtly altered
the context in which the debate about the euro has been taking place - even
though he claimed he was not specifically talking about joining the single
currency. So far the argument about entering has centred on Gordon Brown's
five economic tests, including whether Britain's economic cycle could
converge with Europe's and whether entry into the single currency would be
good for the City.
Mr Blair has inverted this. Instead of asking when Britain might be ready to
join the eurozone, he seemed to be asking when the eurozone will be ready
for British membership. He asserted that liberalisation of energy, financial
services, labour markets, air travel and radical reform of the common
agricultural policy could no longer be put off. These are all causes
deserving strong support - but they have not until now been closely linked
in the public mind with Britain's eventual entry into the euro. Of course,
Mr Blair was speaking 5,000 miles away and was talking up the sort of things
he knew would appeal to his local audience. Reform of the CAP - which pays
European farmers grossly inflated prices to produce products that developing
countries could do far cheaper - is obviously something that would appeal to
Brazil as well as every developing country.
Mr Blair also knows that whatever he says anywhere in the world about Europe
or the euro - when British journalists are present - will be relayed home at
internet speed. He knew that his remarks would be interpreted within the
context of the Treasury's recent private hints playing down the prospect of
a referendum being held within the next four years (unless, of course, the
euro-friendly Kenneth Clarke becomes Tory leader, in which case all bets are
off). Mr Blair was warning other European countries that the Barcelona
economic summit in March next year was a make-or-break situation. But what
is economic reform to Mr Blair is hard domestic politics for other nations -
such as the French government daring to challenge the privileges of its
farmers in an election year or other EU governments plucking up the courage
to take on their domestic energy or telecommunications monopolies.
Although Mr Blair claimed not to be refining Labour policy on the single
currency, he emphasised that the Barcelona summit would be vital to `the
whole enterprise of the future prosperity of Europe', coming as it did
shortly after the launch of the euro, when the new notes and coins would be
in general circulation for the first time. He clearly feels that progress
made in Barcelona could affect the climate of acceptance for the euro in the
UK. It thus becomes another vital factor in determining whether the
government takes advantage of a possible `window of opportunity' to campaign
for the euro should one open during the next two or three years.
Such a favourable conjunction of events would include a successful Barcelona
summit, a strengthening of the euro as a currency (if only on the back of a
declining dollar), a recovering UK economy and that nice Mr Clarke leading
the Conservative party. Even so, it would be taking a huge risk with
Eurosceptic UK public opinion. At the moment Mr Blair seems to feel in his
heart that Britain should be part of the euro at some stage but Mr Brown
feels in his head that it does not make sense in the short term. Until the
two of them sort out their own definitive timetable they should be
completely unsurprised if every remark they make with the word `Europe' in
it is crawled over for hidden meanings. 
Source: GUARDIAN 01/08/2001 P17 
 <<...>> 
Blair warns EU over reforms 
Warning shot for CAP, as prime minister urges European partners to 'practise
what they preach' in the interests of world trade 

Special report: globalisation 
Michael White in Sao Paulo
Guardian 
Tuesday July 31, 2001 
Tony Blair last night challenged Britain's European partners to practise
what they preach by grasping the nettle of agricultural reform and opening
up the EU's protected markets to outside competition. 
In an unexpectedly strong speech in Brazil during a six day tour of central
and south America, the prime minister urged Latin America to embrace the
global economy - while admitting that Europe cannot dodge necessary reforms
indefinitely either. 
Mr Blair's crucial passage explicitly linked expanded free trade to
agricultural protectionism, embodied in the EU's costly common agricultural
policy. 
A relic of the 1950s, CAP has little benefited Britain but is fiercely
defended by France, not least at the last World Trade Organisation
negotiations in Uruguay. 
"Only a global [trade] round can provide the context for real liberalisation
of agriculture markets, the big prize for countries like Brazil. The UK is a
long-standing advocate of reform in Europe. We will continue to press for
major change to the CAP - phasing out price support and putting European
farming on a truly sustainable footing," Mr Blair warned. 
Mr Blair's spokesman said that the prime minister was deliberately making
the speech in Latin America to underline the need for Europe to reform
itself if it wanted other parts of the world to accept greater economic
liberalism in the forthcoming world trade talks. 
He said: "You cannot argue for reform in Latin America unless you are
prepared to face up to the need to modernise and liberalise outdated
industries in Europe. 
After flying overnight from Jamaica to the capital Brasilia, a city of 2m,
Mr and Mrs Blair and their travelling party of businessmen were lavishly
welcomed by President Fernando Cardoso. His centre-right coalition is
promoting Blairite privatisation in the face of rising debt and corruption
charges after a decade where annual inflation has been cut from 1,000% plus
to single figures. 
In the speech Mr Blair was set to deliver to business leaders in Sao Paulo -
the industrial heart of the world's 9th largest economy - he lavished praise
on his hosts for the rich diversity of their country and urged them to keep
their reformist nerve. But much of his attention was directed to
contemporary struggles closer to home and he warned that next spring's EU
summit in Barcelona is "make or break for economic reform in Europe, a real
test of our collective European leadership" at which plans must be turned
into action. 
In the wake of renewed speculation about his plans for staging the promised
referendum on the single currency, Downing Street was last night adamant
that not a word in his text was about the euro. 
Officials dismissed suggestions that his Sao Paulo speech amounted to making
economic reform at Barcelona a "sixth test" of British euro-membership, on
top of Gordon Brown's existing five. 
With the world anxious to fend off another recession, this is no time for
rows, ministers know. 
The chancellor's speech in New York this month stressed similar enthusiasm
for global free trade and the "knowledge economy". 
Trade between the EU and its fledgling Latin counterpart, Mercosur, is as
important as trade within them, Mr Blair stressed. He gave his blessing to
the emerging pan-American free trade zone. 
Mr Blair admits he is powerless to prevent continued media intrigue on the
euro - "it makes no difference what I say". By way of contrast his
determination to liberalise, preferably with Chancellor Gerhard Schroder of
Germany, EU energy, airline, financial services, new technology and capital
markets is very real. 
Only by creating more competition, more open trade and innovation could
Europe, and historically protectionist states like Brazil and Argentina,
promote "both economic dynamism and social justice" he said in last night's
text - a familiar repetition of the Blair-Clinton Third Way mantra. 
Tonight, the Blairs and Cardosos fly on to the border with Argentina for a
three-way summit with President Fernando de la Rua. 
        
 <<...>> 
Blair takes free trade crusade to Argentina 
Special report: globalisation 
Michael White in Sao Paulo
Guardian 
Wednesday August 1, 2001 
Tony Blair will today offer British support to Argentina in its struggle to
avoid economic collapse - in return for Buenos Aires joining an Anglo-Latin
alliance to promote free trade against the militancy of anti-globalisation
campaigners. 
After using his six-day tour of central and Latin America to brand
protesters who disrupted the Gothenburg and Genoa summits as both misguided
and wrong, Mr Blair wants to enlist emerging economic powers such as
Argentina, Brazil and Mexico to help make his case. 
"The prime minister believes people at the sharp end of the globalisation
debate have a much more realistic view of the benefits of globalisation than
was seen in the caricature of the debate from some of the demonstrators in
Genoa," his official spokesman said. 
Mr Blair is still smarting at the way progress on trade, environmental and
other reforms was overshadowed by a militant minority of protesters. But he
appears to have modified his tone - even as his talks with Brazil have
reinforced his conviction that he is right. 
An informal alliance with leading Latin American states to promote
globalisation would also serve to counter protectionist instincts within the
EU, Downing Street claims. 
After Mr Blair again criticised anti-globalisation campaigners in a speech
to business leaders in Sao Paulo, his detractors finally caught up with him
yesterday when a Greenpeace activist was manhandled by police. 
The Briton had tried to hand over a letter protesting at continued British
imports of wood, notably chipboard made from illegally logged timber from
Brazil's threatened rain forests. The protester was not detained. 
Mr Blair and his Brazilian host, President Fernando Henrique Cardoso, later
flew to the spectacular Iguazu falls on the Argentine border for a three-way
summit with President Fernando de la Rua of Argentina. 
Nearly 20 years after Britain and Argentina went to war over the Falkland
Islands, Mr Blair will become the first serving prime minister to step on
Argentine soil when he joins President de la Rua for a symbolic meeting
today. 
Both have agreed to put the disputed sovereignty issue to one side and
resume normal bilateral relations on economic and political issues,
including fishing and oil exploration off the Falklands. 
Mr Blair wishes to go further, even as the Argentine government grapples
with a financial crisis that threatens a decade of relatively stable growth
since the peso was tied to the US dollar in 1991. 
Ironically the strong peso has damaged Argentina in a way familiar to
British exporters travelling with Mr Blair in search of business: by making
imports cheaper and exports less of a bargain. 
Brazil undermined its neighbour still further by devaluing its currency in
1999. Spending cuts agreed this weekend may help to stave off devaluation
for Argentina, but it is reeling from a loss of jobs and investor confidence
and rising debt. 

Demonstrators who died before Genoa 
Guardian 
Wednesday August 1, 2001 
The Italian police and carabinieri did not stop killing unarmed
demonstrators after 1960 (Genoa revisited, July 30). The following is not an
exhaustive list, but deaths since then at their hands have included: 1968,
two farmworkers shot in Avola, Sicily; 1969, at least one man shot in
Battipaglia, Naples; 1970, Franco Serantini, a young anarchist, who died in
a prison cell after being beaten during a demo in Pisa; 1975, Varalli and
Zibecchi, respectively shot and run over by a jeep in Milan; 1977, Francesco
Lo Russo, university student, shot in Bologna; 1978, Giorgiana Masi,
schoolchild, shot in Rome. 
Stuart Hood (Letters, July 30) is also right about the "anarchist [who]
'fell' out of a fourth floor window when under police interrogation" in
Milan in 1969. His name was Giuseppe Pinelli. The senior policeman involved
in the case went on trial and was acquitted. To the best of my knowledge, no
one else was even taken to court. 
What are the chances of there being any real difference following the recent
death of Carlo Giuliani in Genoa? There must be an international inquiry.
Giorgio Giandomenici
London 


Italy to study Genoa violence 
Prime minister bows to pressure over inquiry into police 'brutality''

Special report: globalisation 
Rory Carroll in Rome
Guardian 
Tuesday July 31, 2001 
The Italian government bowed last night to domestic and international
outrage over the blood-soaked G8 summit in Genoa by signalling it would
accept a parliamentary inquiry. 
Cabinet ministers persuaded the prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, that
blocking the inquiry would be interpreted as an attempt to cover up the
police violence which wounded more than 240 anti-globalisation protesters. 
Anxious to avoid another public relations calamity, the government granted
the inquiry in exchange for the opposition's pledge to drop a request for
the resignation of the interior minister, Claudio Scajola. 
President Carlo Azeglio Ciampi was mobilised last night to formally request
the investigation. Parliamentary leaders will hammer out details later this
week. 
Mr Berlusconi has calculated that the findings are more likely to blame
police commanders, most of whom were appointed by the previous centre-left
government, rather than his ministers. 
Despite the apparent climbdown yesterday Mr Berlusconi hardened his public
statements in support of the police, knowing that Italians have shrugged off
the international outcry over police brutality. 
An opinion poll in the newspaper Corriere della Sera revealed that Italians
were critical of police not because they beat peaceful protesters, but
because they failed to stop rioters infiltrating the summit. 
If police officers overreacted they would be punished, but "so-called
pacifists" who hurled stones and petrol bombs deserved a robust response,
said Mr Berlusconi. 
Meanwhile the investigations by the government and magistrates intensified
yesterday. Mr Scajola, was studying a report last night which was expected
to name the officials and police commanders who blundered. Three officials
from his department returned to Rome after apparently heated interviews with
colleagues and police commanders in Genoa. Delays in allowing those detained
to contact lawyers were among the report's criticisms. 
International condemnation of the police has centred on a raid on the
headquarters of the Genoa Social Forum, an umbrella protest group, which
left about 60 protesters injured. Hours later, scores were allegedly
tortured by police. 
Of the six judicial inquiries into the summit underway, three investigation
particular police tactics: their behaviour during the street battles, the
raid, and the alleged torture. 
Magistrates are working their way through questioning all the officers who
participated in the raid, beginning with the 13 commanders. 
They are expected to apportion blame for the decisions to strike at midnight
instead of dawn and to deploy officers who were hyped up from being on the
streets for 12 hours. A key issue will be whether commanders consulted the
prefect, Arnaldo La Barbera, before the raid. If so, the chain of command
would suggest Mr Scajola was also informed, which he denies. 
The Rome daily newspaper La Repubblica said the magistrates wanted to
interview face-to-face the 93 protesters arrested at the headquarters,
despite the fact that scores were deported and may be banned from entering
Italy for years. Magistrates are also reported to want to reconstruct the
raid using dozens of volunteers acting out the roles. Information from
protesters' websites is being also being collated. 
The tension surrounding the investigations also triggered recriminations
between the police, financial police, penitentiary police and paramilitary
carabinieri yesterday. 
Alfonso Sabella, director of the mobile penitentiary police, GOM, said: "I
am sure that my men did not carry out organised beatings. However, I cannot
rule out isolated episodes which we are looking into. Whoever erred will not
go unpunished." 


Seeking justice in Genoa 
Guardian 
Tuesday July 31, 2001 
You report (Briton to sue Genoa police over 'torture and kidnap', July 30)
that our consul could not get access to the British detainees because,
according to the Foreign Office, Italian domestic law stated that the
carabinieri had 48 hours to put them before a magistrate and the magistrate
had 48 hours to investigate before the consul was allowed contact. Why did
they not insist that the Italian government applied the Vienna convention? 
By this universally recognised international treaty citizens must be allowed
prompt access to their consulates. There is a proviso embodied in the
appropriate article: "The rights referred to in paragraph 1 of this article
shall be exercised in conformity with the laws and regulations of the
receiving state, subject to the proviso, however, that the said laws and
regulations must enable full effect to be given to the purposes for which
the rights accorded under this article are intended." 
In other words, it is not open to any state in breach of the Vienna
convention provisions on consular access to plead domestic law or
regulations in their defence, and the Foreign Office remarks on the
applicability of Italian domestic law were clearly wrong.
Stephen Jakobi
Director, Fair Trials Abroad
StephenJakobi@compuserve.com 


Comment 
Genoa revisited 
Four decades ago police shot dead eight protesters on Italian streets. The
demonstrators took all the blame

Special report: globalisation 
Philip Cooke
Guardian 
Monday July 30, 2001 
The day after the funeral of Carlo Giuliani, the demonstrator shot dead on
the streets of Genoa, an anonymous police officer interviewed in the Italian
daily La Repubblica likened the behaviour of his colleagues to that of the
Chilean police under Pinochet. Yet no mention has been made of a more
obvious, and specifically Italian, historical parallel. 
On June 30 1960 the streets of Genoa were also filled with protesters and
police. This time the protest was not against globalisation, but the
inclusion of a neo-fascist party, the MSI, in a coalition formed by the
Christian Democrat prime minister Fernando Tambroni. It was only 15 years
since the fall of Mussolini and the people of Genoa, a city steeped in
anti-fascism, were not prepared to accept Tambroni and, above all, the MSI,
who wanted to hold their party congress in the city the next day. 
After a peaceful start, the demonstrators moved from the rally towards
Piazza de Ferrari, passing a monument to partisans killed in the second
world war. As more and more insults were hurled at the ranks of police, an
order was given to charge the crowd. Armoured cars, police on horseback, and
baton-wielding carabinieri set about the demonstrators, who comprised
dockers, young people dressed in striped T-shirts (an icon of the period)
and many of the partisans who fought to rid the city of the fascists and
Nazis in 1943-1945. 
The police were aided by an anti-riot squad, drafted in from Padua. This
squad, as well as many elements of the police and the carabinieri, were
suspected of extreme rightwing sympathies. Rumours circulated that they had
been locked in their barracks for a week to build up their aggression. 
But Genoa is not an easy city to police. The narrow streets of the historic
centre are easy to escape down. And the fleeing protesters were aided by the
local populace, who hurled whatever household objects came to hand on to the
heads of the pursuers. The tables were soon turned and the police were on
the receiving end of a lesson which has become part of Genoese collective
memory. 
After several hours of rioting - which saw terrible injuries on all sides,
but no deaths - the situation was finally brought under control by groups of
partisans who appealed for calm. With the threat of further violence, the
neo-fascists had no option but to pack their bags and go home. Massimo
D'Alema, the head of the main leftwing opposition party who is calling for
the resignation of the interior minister after the G8 violence, was in Genoa
at the time where his father was a senior communist party official. 
As so often happens in Italy, the protest movement spread to other cities in
the north, as well as to Sicily. In separate incidents, three protesters
were shot dead in Sicily. But the most notorious events occurred in Reggio
Emilia, where five protesters were killed on July 7. The killings provoked
outrage in Italy and abroad, even if some sections of the American press
seemed to approve. Tambroni and the neo-fascists were toppled and the MSI
returned to government only in 1994 - by which time they had changed their
name to Alleanza Nazionale -alongside Silvio Berlus coni's Forza Italia.
After this year's elections, they are back in power. 
Now that the argument has moved away from condemnation of the G8 protesters
towards denunciations of the violence of the Italian police, many
commentators are asking what the chances are of justice for those who were
injured and, in the case of Giuliani, killed. As always in Italy, the legal
situation is complex. 
Under fascism it was not possible to proceed against the police. In theory,
this changed with the foundation of the Italian republic after the war. But
until 1960, even though 94 Italians had been killed during protests or
strikes and 400 had sustained gunshot wounds, no case had ever made it to
the courts. 
The killings at Reggio Emilia that year were, however, of such gravity that
the Bolognese court authorised proceedings against two senior police
officers. Despite apparently damning evidence, one was found not guilty and
the other let off on grounds of insufficient evidence. The written judgment
argued that the shootings themselves could not be considered excessive as
the demonstrators had placed themselves in an "abnormally dangerous
situation". 
Just like in more recent events, the demonstrators, so the argument went,
had only themselves to blame for what happened to them. In a separate case,
two police officers accused of torturing a pair of teenagers were never
brought to trial as what occurred did not "constitute a crime". 
Of the hundreds of protesters arrested after the 1960 Genoa demonstration,
on the other hand, 41 were found guilty and received sentences of up to four
years in jail. One claimed for years that it was not a paving stone, but a
tomato that he threw at the police. In Sicily, 53 protesters were brought to
trial. All were found guilty and one, Filippo Soma, was condemned to six
years and eight months in jail. More than 40 years on, no police officer or
state functionary has been punished by the law for the events of 1960. 
* Philip Cooke is a lecturer in Italian at Strathclyde University. 
p.e.cooke@strath.ac.uk 

Briton to sue Genoa police over 'torture and kidnap' 
Special report: global recession 
Paul Kelso
Guardian 
Monday July 30, 2001 
One of the five Britons allegedly beaten and detained by police during the
G8 summit in Genoa last week is to sue the Italian authorities. 
Norman Blair, 38, was one of a number of people reportedly injured and
imprisoned by Italian police after a raid on a school that protesters from
the Genoa Social Forum had converted into their headquarters. 
Mr Blair claims he was "tortured and kidnapped by the Italian state", and
said last night that other protesters were likely to take legal action. 
The Britons were injured when scores of carabinieri stormed the school last
weekend, breaking down the gates with an armoured car and allegedly lashing
out indiscriminately at protesters. 
The demonstrators were then taken to the Bolzaneto detention centre, which
Mr Blair described as "the sort of place where you know terrible things
happen". 
The Britons were among 90 people seized in the raid, and were detained for
five days. They had no access to British consular staff before they were
freed without charge and deported. Despite not having been convicted of any
offence they were banned from Italy for five years and had to pay their own
air fares home. 
"I have contacted lawyers in Italy and I'm going to be taking legal action
against the police in Italy, as is everyone else who was arrested in that
school that I have talked to," Mr Blair said yesterday. 
The Foreign Office yesterday moved to deny claims that consular staff in
Italy had made no attempt to contact Mr Blair and the other Britons. 
A spokesman said that Italian law requires foreign nationals be seen by a
magistrate within 48 hours of being detained and access must be granted to
consular staff within a further 48 hours. It took a magistrate four days to
deal with the 90 protesters who were arrested. 
The Foreign Office is to lodge a formal protest this week on behalf of the
Britons with the Italian foreign ministry. 
Mr Blair, 35-year-old Daniel McQuillan, Richard Moth, 32, all from north
London, and his girlfriend, Nicola Doherty, 27, were freed after appearing
in court on Wednesday. 
The other Briton, Mark Covell, 33, from London, remains in an Italian
hospital under treatment for internal bleeding and broken ribs. 
Mr Blair said the police subjected the detainees to psychological abuse,
keeping them awake for more than 24 hours and denied medical attention to
those with broken limbs. Others claimed to have been spat and urinated on
and made to sing fascist songs. 
Links
Genoa police (in Italian) www.poliziastato.it/questura/genova 

Wombles
www.wombleaction.mrnice.net 

Ya Basta (in Italian) 
www.yabasta.it 


More fallout over Genoa 
Guardian 
Monday July 30, 2001 
During all the coverage of Silvio Berlusconi's embarrassment at
international complaints about the brutality of the Italian police at Genoa,
you fail to mention Tony Blair's reaction at this issue after the summit
took place ('Brutal' Genoa police may be sacked, July 28) . 
Blair defended the police's behaviour. If Berlusconi must respond for the
events that took place in Genoa, why doesn't Blair present a public apology
for his declarations, particularly now that the government is going to
present a complaint over the treatment given to the British protesters at
Genoa? Blair's cynicism has reached unprecedented heights.
Beatriz Valle
London
Beatvalle@aol.com 
Does no one, when writing about Italian police methods, remember how after a
bomb planted by fascists was exploded in a bank in Milan in 1969, an
anarchist was arrested and "fell" out of a fourth floor window when under
police interrogation? Dario Fo, the Nobel prize- winning author and
playwright, wrote a splendid play on the subject, Accidental Death of an
Anarchist.
Stuart Hood 
Brighton
stuart.hood@virgin.net 
Let's see now, what did the carabinieri do when it was Blair's son who was
accused of unruly behaviour?
Mick Williams
Stoke-on-Trent
mick.williams@geo2.poptel.org.uk 


Lights, camera, protest... 
Last weekend, 52 Italian filmmakers, including the 81-year-old director of
The Battle of Algiers, took to Genoa's streets, with the camera as their
only weapon 
Observer 
Sunday July 29, 2001 
At last weekend's summit of G8 leaders in Genoa, cameras were in the thick
of the action. Police turned them on protesters, protesters turned them on
the police, and protesters turned them on each other. The lens was a weapon,
a deterrent and a political tool. 
In a third-floor office above the Piazza di Portello, veteran Italian film
director Francesco Maselli is sitting by the window looking down at a small
police blockade and several hundred demonstrators staging a peaceful sit-in.
It is from here that the diminutive and sprightly 70-year-old, whose career
spans more than 50 years, is co-ordinating his own union of politics and
film. His Il Cinema Italiano Con Il Genoa Social Forum is a collective of 52
Italian film directors who have come togethe to document the weekend's
anti-globalisation protests. 
Maselli and his colleagues are filming events as they unfold with the aim of
editing the footage into one film that will explore the passions and aims of
the hundreds of small campaigning groups that have come from all over the
world to pack the boarded-up streets of Genoa. It's something they feel the
mainstream media, more concerned with broadcasting sensation and the
workings of the summit itself, will fail to do. Documentary filmmakers often
claim objectivity. Here, filming is overtly, unashamedly and unavoidably
saturated with passion, emotion and involvement. 
From Gillo Pontecorvo, the 81-year-old director of the 1966 neo-realist
masterpiece Battle of Algiers , to Francesca and Cristina Comencini, the
filmmaking daughters of the celebrated director Luigi Comencini, who in the
1960s and 1970s was three times nominated for the Palme D'Or at Cannes,
these filmmakers believe strongly that politics and film, if not politics
and life, are inseparable and all support the non-violent protests. 
Many of these filmmakers began working in cinema immediately after the
Second World War when neo-realism first flourished in Italy. The neo-realist
concerns - for covering contemporary events, for exploring the margins and
workings of society and for taking film out of the studio and on to the
streets - are still very much alive. 
'There are two generations of Italian cinema present here in Genoa,' Maselli
explains over the sound of sirens and shouting outside. 'I am the
co-ordinator, the idea is mine, but the movie will be very much linked to
the creativity of each individual director and to the final editing.' 
This is not Maselli's first collective project. But just as he is beginning
to describe the collective film he shot in 1984 at the public funeral of the
revered, long-time leader of the Italian Communist Party, Enrico Berlinguer,
the radio volume is suddenly turned up and Andrea Rocco, Genoa's film
commissioner, states: 'One of the protesters has been killed, shot by the
police.' 
The news that Carlo Giuliani, a 23-year-old Genovese protester, has been
shot dead brings Maselli back to the window. He warns a journalist with a
video camera not to film the police gathered below. Many police and
protesters are reacting badly to the filming and one of Maselli's cameramen
had his camera kicked off his shoulder and stamped on earlier. 
Maselli's sympathies may lie with the protesters, but he is striving to
represent all of the various campaigning groups in Genoa under the umbrella
of the Genoa Social Forum (a huge wallchart in his office dissects the
protesters into pacifisti, anarchici, missionari, riformisti economici and
so on). For Maselli and the others, making this film is a way of
understanding the protests as much as supporting them. 
It's also part of a tradition: many of these filmmakers have worked together
before on other political projects such as the national labour strike and
during the first Berlusconi government in 1994. 
Next to arrive is Ettore Scola, one-time member of the Communist Party and a
well-known figure in Italian cinema. A master of comedy and a provocatively
political filmmaker, he returns from his day's filming sporting the
collective's bright red vest emblazoned with the words 'Il Cinema Italiano a
Genova'. 
'I've been filming for three days,' he announces. 'Yesterday, I shot a
simulation of an Iranian woman being killed by stones which was part of a
demonstration by a group of Iranian people. Today, we had a real victim, and
we were shooting when the young man died. After today's tragedy, they must
interrupt the G8. This is the last G8. The G8 is dead!' Scola says the
protests in Genoa remind him of the events of 1968, when civil unrest spread
through much of Europe and America. But he believes the driving force behind
the protests is a deeper search for a guiding ideology; anti-globalisation
is simply the excuse. 
Out on the streets on Saturday, Ignazio Oliva, 30, is in a back street
filming several lone campaigners shouting furiously at a police line. An
actor-turned-cameraman, Oliva is symbolic of the enthusiasm fuelling this
project. Maselli announced his idea to film the protests only a fortnight
before the G8 summit, and within days he had gathered a team. No one is
being paid, and the production company, Luna Rossa, under the producer,
Mauro Berardi, has already succeeded in pre-selling the film to Italian
television on the strength of the directors' names. 
Oliva, who has appeared in Italian films including Bernardo Bertolucci's
Stealing Beauty, volunteered for the project as soon as he heard of it and
went straight to Rome to assist with pre-production. In Genoa, he started
out as cameraman for the director Francesca Comencini, shooting the live
theatre events that formed part of the wider demonstrations. 
By the Saturday, he is filming alone, tracking the more violent, extreme
protesters and following his own interests and instincts. 'When I read about
this group of directors,' Oliva explains, 'I asked if I could help out. We
want to record and understand what's going on here. The key thing for me is
to lend a hand. I'm here as a human being and a demonstrator as much as a
cameraman and a filmmaker.' 
As filming wraps on Saturday night, Maselli explains that he will take stock
of events when he is back in Rome. The weekend was a time for involvement
and reaction, and emotions ran high amid the unpredictability of events. On
the eve of Saturday's mass protest, Scola had said to me: 'Instead of asking
questions, why are you not demonstrating? Tomorrow, don't do interviews. 
'Editing will be very interesting and very difficult because we have all
these different approaches,' Maselli says. 'There is a common mood among the
directors, but the difference with past projects is that this movement is
totally new. We have had to go much deeper than before because we need to
understand.' 


Police face sack for Genoa 'brutality' 
Special report: globalisation 
Rory Carroll in Genoa
Guardian 
Saturday July 28, 2001 
Italy's prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, yesterday acknowledged
international outrage over police brutality at last weekend's G8 summit by
hinting he would purge the commanders responsible. 
In a nervous address to parliament, he promised there would be no cover-up
of the blood-soaked public relations disaster which has tarnished his
two-month old government. 
"If there were abuses, excesses and violence, and which may come to light in
internal investigations by the interior ministry and the judiciary, there
will be no cover-up for those who have violated the law." 
Further pressure was placed on the Italian government when the foreign
secretary, Jack Straw, threatened to make an official complaint about the
treatment of the British protesters. He has asked the Italian ambassador in
London why the Britons apparently waited longer than Spanish detainees to
see their national consul. 
Mr Berlusconi, visibly shaken, said those who made mistakes will pay the
price. He noted that the chiefs of the police and paramilitary carabinieri
had been appointed by the previous government. 
However, he resisted opposition demands for a parliamentary commission of
inquiry. 
One rioter was killed and scores of protesters were beaten up in police
custody during the Group of Eight summit in Genoa, prompting condemnation
from European politicians and human rights groups. Germany asked for an
official explanation from Rome. Italian magistrates have opened three
inquiries into police actions. 
Mr Berlusconi is said to have been shocked by television footage aired on
Thursday of savagery during a police raid on the school, which was being
used as a headquarters by the protesters' umbrella group, the Genoa Social
Forum. 
The media tycoon was also said to be furious that his own network, Canale 5,
and Rai 1, a state network, transmitted images damaging to his government. 
The trademark ebullience absent, Mr Berlusconi told the senate in Rome that
his predecessors deserved blame for choosing to host the summit in a
medieval port city where anarchists could turn peaceful anti-capitalist
protests into mayhem. "But I think we all agree there should be no confusion
between those who attacked and those who were attacked." 
Cabinet colleagues have rallied round the interior minister, Claudio
Scajola, a Berlusconi protege, who has faced clamour to resign. The head of
police, Gianni De Gennaro, has said Mr Scajola was kept informed at all
times, but the minister claims he was not warned in advance of the raid on
the school. 
Pressure is mounting on governments in Germany, France, Spain and Britain to
formally protest at the treatment of their nationals. 
Police credibility has been shredded by the fact that magistrates have
decided that all but one of the 93 people detained in the raid were not
violent anarchists, as the police had claimed, and have released them. 


Looking out for liberty 
Labour's response to Genoa is alarming

Special report: globalisation 
Leader
Guardian 
Saturday July 28, 2001 
One week on, and the shock of Genoa has not faded. On the contrary, the last
seven days have revealed that the ugly television pictures broadcast last
week from the G8 summit were the least of it. Police brutality on an even
more savage scale was meted out to anti-capitalist protesters - including
peaceful ones - far away from the cameras. British activists have come home
recounting desperate experiences, explaining how the headquarters of their
non-violent Genoa Social Forum were raided by uniformed thugs who clubbed,
kicked and punched indiscriminately. Later the protesters were held in
conditions they likened to Chile or Argentina under dictatorship: denied
legal or consular access, they were deprived of food and sleep for 36 hours
and subjected to a form of psychological torture. One account speaks of
demonstrators beaten if they refused to say out loud that the carabinieri
were their "government". 
These revelations are, most immediately, a severe problem for Italy. Silvio
Berlusconi has promised no cover-up; he needs to go further and heed the
calls for an independent, parliamentary inquiry. Even that may not be
enough; the demand for an international investigation may grow. Italy needs
to handle this matter with care. There are already rumours of fascist
infiltration into the Genoa police force; today demonstrators will gather
outside the Italian embassy in London to vent their anger. If this concern
is not taken seriously and the carabinieri's behaviour goes unpunished,
Rome's reputation will be irreparably damaged. Italy is a lead member of the
European Union and a democracy: the world expects it to behave like one. 
But Genoa has left the British government some questions of its own to
answer. For our most senior politicians let us down badly. They were among
the first to condemn the protesters. When Europe minister Peter Hain dared
suggest that "serious questions" had to be asked about the police operation,
he was rapidly slapped down by a Number 10 anxious not to offend Italy
(seen, along with Spain, as a crucial ally for London within the EU).
Instead Tony Blair spoke of a "world gone mad" that paid more attention to
demonstrations than to the declarations he and his fellow leaders had made
inside Genoa's ducal palace. Jack Straw followed his master, describing the
demonstrators as "mad". Small wonder that Britain has not made a formal
complaint to Rome; that Mr Straw has not spoken to his Italian opposite
number and that it has been the British media - not government - which has
objected to this vile treatment of British citizens. 
Unfortunately, the week's events are all of a piece with two of New Labour's
least attractive traits: its authoritarian streak and tin ear for liberty.
As usual, ministers have lumped peaceful protesters alongside violent ones -
rubbishing the lot as nutters. The government's updated version of the
Prevention of Terrorism Act is guilty of the same error, failing to
distinguish between legitimate dissent and murderous terror: the former is
criminalised along with the latter. That law, passed last year, would have
made felons of the 1980s anti-apartheid movement, for using Britain as a
base of struggle against a foreign tyranny. 
Our government now has a battery of tools at its disposal for the stifling
of democracy: a demo can be booked for aggravated trespass, obstruction of
the highway and even for stalking. But this does not trouble a prime
minister who condemns such matters as "libertarian nonsense". It does not
trouble him - but it should worry all of us. 


Comment 
Italy's strategy of tension 
Special report: globalisation 
Vittorio Longhi
Guardian 
Friday July 27, 2001 
That night, under helicopter searchlights, in front of the special police
special units, among the screams of young men and women, we were not in
Genoa, nor in Italy, but in another place and another time - it all looked
like an attempt to substitute the current order with a police state." That
is how a group of criminal and civil lawyers from Milan, who witnessed last
weekend's events in Genoa, have reacted to the authorities' actions,
accusing them of lawless suspensions of the basic liberties of those
demonstrators attacked or arrested in the G8 protests. 
Along with the indiscriminate beatings, hundreds were deprived of their
rights of access to lawyers and contact with their families. Yesterday 220
people remained under arrest, including 28 foreigners, while 90 people were
released, without any explanation or excuse. The opposition was, meanwhile,
up in arms in parliament, demanding an investigation into the widespread
police abuses in Genoa. 
There is no doubt that the Italian government broke some fundamental laws of
the penal code. What happened in Genoa during the G8 summit has no precedent
in Italy since the left-right street confrontations and the terrorism in the
1970s. But the difference between the hundreds of peaceful demonstrators and
journalists beaten up in that school on Saturday night, and the ghosts of
the Red Brigades or the fascist terror gangs of that time, should have been
evident enough to the police and carabinieri. 
Part of the Interior Ministry, the Italian police seem to have a power
matched by no other European police, while the carabinieri are a military
force and have once again demonstrated that they act like an army. Add to
that a government whose ideology makes no allowance for legitimate peaceful
protests or the damage that a culture of repression will do to Italy. Prime
Minister Berlusconi and his post-fascist deputy, Gianfranco Fini, both
visited Genoa in the run-up to the summit, with Fini boasting that he had
personally finalised the security plans. 
How different things would have been if the centre-left had still been in
power is hard to say. Certainly, the magistrates would have been less
marginalised and could have properly investigated what took place. But
Berlusconi's unwavering support for the police is as well known as his
aversion to magistrates. During the Tangentopoli bribery scandals of the
early 1990s and other investigations into his business affairs, Berlusconi
protested loudly about violations of human rights. But no one from his
party, Forza Italia, has had a single word to say on the repressive violence
in Genoa. 
The centre-left's no-confidence motion in the interior minister, Claudio
Scajola, will inevitably be voted down. What Scajola fears, instead, is a
public investigation into both the police assaults and the connivance of the
police with violent demonstrators. It is not clear yet how black bloc
rioters could hang around the town undisturbed, when police already knew who
and where they were. "The black blocs were an instrument of the police, it
was a clear strategy," Luca Casarini, one of the leaders of the Tute Bianche
(White Overalls) activist group, said yesterday. "I'm not saying everything
was organised and planned in advance. But they used and helped hooliganism
to justify the crackdown. Now the government feels free to attack us." 
Everyone is wary of talking about a new "strategy of tension" - the name
given to the collusion between parts of the Italian state, fascist
terrorists and provocateurs in the 1970s - but Genoa social forum lawyers
say they have damning and incontrovertible evidence of links between
hooligans and police. Meanwhile, forum spokesman Vittorio Agnoletto has been
sacked from his job as a consultant on drugs and youth problems at the
labour ministry. Agnoletto is a doctor and president of Lila, the Italian
league which helps terminal HIV patients. The labour minister, Roberto
Maroni, from the Northern League, justified the sacking on the grounds that
that Mr Agnoletto had spoken against the government in Genoa. 
The Genoa events have at least had the effect of helping the Italian left to
regroup. The leaders of the main centre-left party, the Left Democrats, kept
away from the protests and none of their leaders marched with the peaceful
army of 200,000 people, but they drew the line at Berlusconi's attempt to
justify police violence, which reached its climax with the manslaughter of a
23-year-old boy. Now, in the aftermath, they are facing up to the fact that
politics has gone back on the streets and all these people need to be
represented. The possibility of a dialogue or even a loose alliance with
those campaigning against neo-liberal globalisation has opened up. 
* Vittorio Longhi is an Italian journalist based in Rome.
longhiv@tiscalinet.it 
Full text
Full text of protesters' statement 
Related special reports
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George Bush's America 
Related articles
19.07.2001: Bush flies in to face critics
18.07.2001: British protesters' train to Genoa cancelled
17.07.2001: Genoa bomb sparks security fears
15.07.2001: Genoa defends forbidden city from global protest
11.07.2001: Missiles to protect summit leaders 
Comment and analysis
19.07.2001: Do they protest too much?
18.07.2001: The battle for Genoa
18.07.2001: Summits, showmanship and saving face in Italy 
Audio
19.07.2001: 18,000 police and no protesters in sight (2mins 03) 
Other resources
The G8 summit explained
Weblog special: the G8 summit
Interactive guide: How does missile defence work?
Genoa: the story in links 
Useful links
Official G8 Genoa site
City of Genoa
Genoa Social Forum 
One World 
Globalise Resistance
Reclaim the Streets 
Squall magazine 


The dark side of Italy's paramilitary force 
Special report: globalisation 
Rory Carroll
Guardian 
Friday July 27, 2001 
Rightwing thugs employed as Italian police officers were told by superiors
they could brutalise with impunity the protesters detained in Genoa, it was
claimed yesterday. 
Officers seized the opportunity to batter, terrify and humiliate dozens of
people after being assured they had the "cover" to do so, according to the
Rome daily La Repubblica. 
An anonymous police officer confirmed the accounts of torture given by the
bruised, shaken protestors released from prison. "Unfortunately, it is all
true." 
The officer claimed that as last weekend's assaults intensified and victims
passed out he asked colleagues to stop. He alleges that they told him: "We
don't have to worry because we are covered." 
He admitted his men had run amok in the protesters' headquarters but claimed
that the alleged torture in the Bolzaneto holding centre was the work of
GOM, the penitentiary police. He said GOM officers wore black gloves and
boasted in advance of teaching the anarchists a lesson. 
The three inquiries launched into the police violence will attempt to
determine who gave the orders but there is no doubt that scores of police
officers agreed to follow the orders. 
The question of how such bloodlust consumed some members of the police and
paramilitary carabinieri has sparked uproar in parliament. There is pressure
for a commission of inquiry which could oust cabinet ministers. 
Francisco Martone, a Green party senator, told the BBC that fascists had
infiltrated the police. Released Italian, German and Spanish protestors
yesterday spoke of heads being banged against walls, threats of rape with
batons, people vomiting blood, soiling themselves and being urinated upon. 
Football fans have long complained about the dark side of Italian policing
but opinion polls have shown robust public support for responses to fan
violence. 
A green light from above was enough to unleash savagery for a number of
reasons. The police are generally rightwing and have a tradition of
suppressing leftwing protest. A popular ditty goes: "One, two, three, viva
Pinochet/ four, five, six, death to the Jews." 
Silvio Berlusconi's ruling coalition includes the post-fascist National
Alliance which won last May's election partly on a platform of law and
order. Some commentators suggest this may have emboldened police commanders.

The carabinieri are considered less political but can be gung-ho. Jokes
about their stupidity pepper Italian dinner parties. 
The decision to deploypoorly trained conscripts serving their one-year
military service was a major blunder. They proved easily frightened and
easily provoked, and after two days of dodging rocks they wanted revenge.
Many are from the south where poverty, poor education and conservatism
breeds suspicion of the anti-globalisation movement. 
The intelligence services hyped them up with warnings of terrorist attack
and supposed anarchist tactics - such as hurling bags of HIV-infected blood.
Days before the summit they were already jumpy. 
Enrico Sciaccaluga, 19, a Genoa student, said some were so agitated the
night of the raid that they appeared drugged. 
Another explanation offered is that the police chief, Gianni De Gennaro,
knew all about fighting the mafia but nothing about crowd control. 
Full text
Full text of protesters' statement 
Related special reports
Global warming 
George Bush's America 
Related articles
19.07.2001: Bush flies in to face critics
18.07.2001: British protesters' train to Genoa cancelled
17.07.2001: Genoa bomb sparks security fears
15.07.2001: Genoa defends forbidden city from global protest
11.07.2001: Missiles to protect summit leaders 
Comment and analysis
19.07.2001: Do they protest too much?
18.07.2001: The battle for Genoa
18.07.2001: Summits, showmanship and saving face in Italy 
Audio
19.07.2001: 18,000 police and no protesters in sight (2mins 03) 
Other resources
The G8 summit explained
Weblog special: the G8 summit
Interactive guide: How does missile defence work?
Genoa: the story in links 
Useful links
Official G8 Genoa site
City of Genoa
Genoa Social Forum 
One World 
Globalise Resistance
Reclaim the Streets 
Squall magazine 

Rome dispatch 

The unacceptable face of protest 

The scenes witnessed at the G8 summit in Genoa raise some serious questions
about the future of the anti-globalisation movement, writes Philip Willan 

Wednesday July 25, 2001 

Having watched the trashing of Genoa from a safe distance, in Rome, I might
have expected to reflect on the events there over the weekend with
dispassionate calm. Instead, I have been surprised at the virulence of the
feelings of disgust, anger and bellicosity that the violent images arouse. 
And they haven't been directed at the police, despite plentiful evidence of
their wholesale brutality. What has struck me is the singular impenitence of
the leaders of the Genoa Social Forum (GSF), who organised the anti-G8
rallies and created the circumstances that led to the city's devastation. 
Everyone knew there would be trouble in Genoa and the GSF's announcement
that they would stage a "peaceful" invasion of the red zone protecting the
summit guaranteed that it arrived. No one, seemingly, thought to change the
plan, despite a summit vigil punctuated by bomb scares and the explosion of
parcel bombs. 
There is no doubt that the vast majority of the hundreds of thousands of
protesters who converged on Genoa wanted to give pacific expression to their
call for a more equitable global economy. But among the more than 700 groups
represented under the umbrella of the social forum there were certainly many
who feel closer to the Black Bloc anarchists than to the uniformed
representatives of what they see as a hostile state. 
Under the circumstances it would have been wise for the protesters to turn
their backs on the summit and march away from its wire fences and police
protectors. Instead, the organisers pressed ahead with a confrontation that
was never going to be peaceful - though the reality probably surpassed their
worst fears. 
The result has indelibly marked the anti-globalisation movement, which was
in any case born of violent street protests, with images of senseless
destruction and hate, while possibly putting at risk the future of peaceful
public protest for a generation. 
To hear the GSF leaders however, the mistakes were all on the other side. A
spokesman for the "white overalls" anti-globalisation movement, Luca
Casarini, wrote an open letter of apology to the people of Genoa, published
by La Repubblica on Monday. 
"Dear people of Genoa, I am sorry. But it should be the police and the
carabinieri who apologise to you because they perpetrated the real violence
against the city," he wrote. 
Shopkeepers and car owners whose property was torched by members of the
Black Bloc may find this less than satisfying. And Mr Casarini's statement
that "throwing stones to stop an inferno seems legitimate to me," hardly
seems the act of contrition that the Genoese were expecting. 
This is not to suggest that the politicians and police who presided over the
collapse of public order in the city are beyond reproach. Eyewitnesses and
marchers have testified that the police were frequently ferocious with the
meek but remained passive observers as the Black Bloc ran amok. 
The failure to control and filter the demonstrators as they arrived in
Genoa, despite a gigantic security operation, and the failure to respond
effectively to the first signs of violence has led to suggestions that Genoa
was actually a vast political trap for the anti-globalisation movement. 
Suspicions have been heightened by the identification of police infiltrators
among the most aggressive sectors of the crowd, and their role has not yet
been adequately explained. Recently broadcast television images raise the
question as to why police standing nearby failed to come to the rescue of
their carabinieri comrades in an isolated jeep - a failure that led to the
shooting of Carlo Giuliani. 
There is no doubt that police more than made up for their initial inactivity
by indiscriminately beating protesters suspected of involvement in the
violence. 
A night raid by police on a Genoa school - where demonstrators were sleeping
- resulted in shocking television pictures of blood-spattered floors and
walls, prompting comparisons with the policing techniques of General
Pinochet's Chile. A comparison the police themselves appear to favour: one
protester has spoken of listening to a doggerel poem praising Pinochet as he
was beaten and threatened in a police barracks on the outskirts of the city.

Lawyers and humanitarian organisations have complained that many of the
foreigners arrested have been denied access to lawyers and consular
assistance, due legal process allegedly giving way to police vendetta. 
For Italy it will be important to re-establish the principle that civilised
standards of policing and the rule of law have to be maintained even in the
most chaotic emergency: the police killing of a demonstrator in Genoa is the
first such incident for almost a quarter of a century. 
For the wider anti-globalisation movement the question remains as to whether
there is a place for violence in the movement's political armoury. What will
the movement do when Nazis against G8 seek a place in their social forum or
the new Red Brigades shoot at police from behind their white-overalled
ranks? 
Today few Italian cities would welcome the demonstrators' return, for all
their just cause. 
Email
mc3390@mclink.it 
Other articles
More articles by Philip Willan 
Useful links
Official G8 Genoa site
City of Genoa
Genoa Social Forum 
One World 
Globalise Resistance
Reclaim the Streets 
Squall magazine 

WTO's reality check 
Qatar to play host for a new round of trade talks as the anti-globalisation
movement is given its first martyr

Special report: globalisation 
Charlotte Denny
Guardian 
Thursday July 26, 2001 
The chaotic scenes outside the Genoa summit of the leading industrialised
countries last weekend will have sent a trickle of sweat down the spines of
senior trade negotiators at the Geneva headquarters of the World Trade
Organisation. 
The anti-globalisation movement, which has just been given its first martyr,
was born on the streets of Seattle 18 months ago as the WTO attempted to
launch a new round of global trade talks. 
Protesters hailed the collapse of the Seattle talks as a victory for direct
action, but in fact the yawning chasm between the negotiating positions of
the WTO's 135 members meant the talks were doomed from the start. 
Incompetent chairing by the host country and the cavalier treatment of
developing countries by the "quad", the world's four most powerful trading
blocs - the United States, the European Union, Japan and Canada - did not
help sweeten the atmosphere. 
Trade ministers are due to meet again this November to try to restart talks.
This time, the venue is Qatar - the only WTO member state which was prepared
to host the world's most unpopular organisation and the caravan of
protesters who are likely to descend on the capital, Doha. 
On Monday, the WTO's head, Mike Moore, will hold a "reality check" in Geneva
to see whether his fractious members are any closer to agreeing an
achievable negotiating agenda. Officially the mood in Geneva is upbeat: the
G8 committed itself to a new round in Genoa and, at a meeting in Zanzibar
earlier this week, the least developed countries indicated they would not
try to block the talks. 
The EU and the US have declared a temporary ceasefire on the many trade
issues which divide them, from bananas to hormone-treated beef, and are
together stressing the importance of negotiating further liberalisation.
Today, the chancellor, Gordon Brown, will add his voice to those warning
that progress on trade is particularly critical, given the downturn in the
world economy. 
Bridging the gaps
Observers worry that the thorny issues which divided the main trading powers
two years ago appear to be largely unresolved. The EU has a long shopping
list of issues it would like to see on the table at Doha, including new
global rules on investment and competition. 
Brussels needs a wide negotiating agenda so it can win some victories in
exchange for the concessions it will be forced to make on agriculture. Most
of the rest of the WTO members simply want the EU to stop subsidising its
farmers and open its markets. They are not particularly enthusiastic about
discussing complicated new areas and worry that an overambitious trade round
could end in failure. 
The US might be prepared to indulge the EU over-investment but it does not
want to talk about competition, and would rather make a few quick deals to
open up access for its powerful financial companies and then go home.
Developing countries are angry that the access to western markets they were
promised during the last round of global trade talks has largely failed to
materialise. 
While tariffs on manufactured goods have fallen from 40% to 4% on average
over the past 50 years, agriculture tariffs remain at between 40 and 50%.
Unsurprisingly, the heavily agricultural economies of the developing world,
struggling to implement the commitments they made in earlier trade deals,
feel they have had a raw deal. 
Most of these disagreements are likely to surface at Mr Moore's reality
check on Monday. David Woods, the editor of Global Trade Agenda, a
Geneva-based magazine, predicts that negotiators are likely to leave for the
long Swiss summer break in a very depressed mood. 
Officials in Geneva face another tricky problem - how to fit 4,000 expected
delegates, 2,000 members of the international media and at least 1,000
representatives of non-governmental organisations into a city which has just
5,000 hotel rooms. Somebody soon is going to have the unenviable job of
telling the US delegation that if President George Bush plans to drop in on
the talks he cannot bring 800 people with him as he did when he visited
Genoa. 
Meanwhile, the non-governmental organisations, which are increasingly
influential players at global summits, are also making their preparations.
The big NGOs like Oxfam, Christian Aid and WWF will be walking a
particularly fine line at Doha - they agree broadly with the
anti-globalisation movement's call for a more equitable global economy, but
few NGOs have any sympathy for calls to shut down the WTO. Even though most
think the the present global trading system is tilted against the poor, they
would rather have a rules-based system than a free for all, where small
countries are forced to negotiate individually with global giants to gain
access to their markets. 
The many opponents of free trade will rejoice if Doha is a repeat of
Seattle, but the NGOs worry that it could fatally damage the organisation.
"I have this fear that the WTO will become downgraded to just another
pointless Geneva-based multilateral organisation," says one senior NGO
policy adviser. 
Nobody denies that the world's richest countries have spent the past 50
years writing the global trading rules in their favour, but as a result the
poor have the most to gain from a new round of talks. With the likely entry
of China to the WTO at Doha, the balance of power within the organisation is
shifting decisively towards the developing world. 
The prospect of another failure is likely to concentrate negotiators' minds
in the coming months. The WTO took more than a year to recover from its
self-inflicted wounds after Seattle. 
A repeat would be a personal disaster for Mr Moore. The New Zealander's term
ends next September, and he does not want to go down in history as the
leader on whose watch the WTO twice failed to get a trade round launched. 
Seasoned trade delegates say the outlook today is not as bleak as it was at
times during the Uruguay round of trade talks. Countries may be adopting
hardline positions publicly, but behind the scenes a lot of work is being
done to reach an agreement. The organisation is no longer "dysfunctional",
in the words of one insider. A consensus at least on a negotiating text will
probably emerge between now and November, although it will be far less
ambitious than originally planned. 
But there will be a critical difference between the Doha talks and
ministerial meetings during the last round - the likely presence of
thousands of protesters. Even though the Genoa summiteers disdained the
rioters, they were unnerved by the protest movement. 
The WTO may find this time that even if it gets its own internal
disagreements resolved, the growing opposition to free trade mobilised by
the anti-globalisation movement may be harder to overcome. 


1,500 mourn idealist Carlo, G8 riot victim 
Informal last rites for protester shot dead as evidence emerges of more
police brutality in custody

Special report: globalisation 
Rory Carroll in Genoa
Guardian 
Thursday July 26, 2001 
Without wreathes, without priests, the coffin of Carlo Giuliani was rolled
in silence through a cemetery of bourgeois grandeur he would have mocked. 
Its Romanesque chapels and Babylonian temples house past generations of the
Genoan nobility and Italian heroes, but 1,500 mourners turned out yesterday
in honour of quite a different sort of hero. 
Squinting under a hot sun, they filed into a mortuary chapel to caress and
kiss the teak coffin containing the first fatality of the anti-globalisation
movement. 
It was draped in the black and red flag of Carlo's football team, Roma, and
on it were placed tokens of friendship: roses wrapped in a black T-shirt,
cigarettes, matches, beads, lire notes. 
Two teenagers inside the chapel offered sips of beer to the queues of
backpackers, housewives, punks, students and pensioners. 
Tribute was paid to Carlo's generosity, passion, idealism and impatience for
justice. No one mentioned politics, globalisation or the police officer who
shot him in the forehead during a riot last Friday. 
"In his short life Carlo has given us many things. Let's try, in Carlo's
name, to be united, to refuse violence," said his father, Giuliano, one of
the few mourners wearing a suit. 
"You, who are young, you want a better world tomorrow morning. We, who are
old, and maybe tired, have learned patience and prudence. But we will go
forward together, through Carlo." 
Apparently addressing his remarks to the media, he added: "These young
people, with torn trousers, pierced faces and broken shoes, you should not
judge them. They have full hearts, heads that think." 
His son died trying to throw a fire extinguisher at police officers trapped
in a Land Rover. The 20-year-old conscript who shot him, Mario Placanica,
has returned home to Sicily but may face charges of manslaughter. 
Mr Giuliani called the killing a homicide but said the conscript deserved
pity and was also a victim. 
Friends said Carlo was no anarchist. He was a sensitive idealist who
preferred the margins of society: squatting, unemployment, living
hand-to-mouth. He was pained and angry, said a cousin. 
Several mourners wore T-shirts printed with the registration number of the
trapped Land Rover, CC AE 217. Others raised clenched fists. 
"For me Carlo is not a martyr, he is just another guy like me. The cops
could have shot me," said Kuno Zahlreich, 30, from Switzerland. 
Tears welled when a guitarist faltered during the song which replaced a
religious ceremony. "I'm trembling, I can't," he said. The crowd clapped in
encouragement and his sniffles turned to lyrics. 
Shouts broke out: "Ciao Carlo, ciao!" A young man grabbed the microphone to
denounce the government but was hushed."Enough, no politics today." 
The Staglieno cemetery contains Oscar Wilde's wife, Constance, British
soldiers killed in the second world war and Giuseppe Mazzini, the idealist
revolutionary of Italian unification. But the rioter who took a bullet in
the head will not rest among them. He will be cremated today and the ashes
given to the family. 


German doubts behind surge in dollar 
Special report: global recession 
Charlotte Denny and Heather Stewart
Guardian 
Tuesday July 24, 2001 
Renewed worries about the health of the German economy and the confirmation
that Washington still favours a strong dollar sent the greenback surging
against other world currencies yesterday. 
Business confidence in the euro zone's largest economy has fallen to its
lowest level for almost five years, according to the monthly index compiled
by a leading economic forecaster, Ifo. 
Analysts said the German business barometer, which is compiled using
information from more than 7,000 companies, is a good indicator of future
economic performance for the euro zone as a whole. "The further drop in the
index means the economy hasn't found a bottom, and it will take longer until
it regains ground," said Ifo economist Gernot Nerb. 
The euro fell 0.5% against the dollar in the wake of the figures'
publication, dipping to 86.53 cents at one point, while sterling dropped
two-thirds of a percentage point to $1.4180. 
The dollar was also up 1% against the yen after Japanese share prices
plunged to 16-year lows overnight. 
The dollar's rise was helped by remarks from the United States treasury
secretary, Paul O'Neill, on his first official visit to Britain. Mr O'Neill
reiterated Washington's commitment to a strong currency and told reporters
that he, not President George Bush, was in charge of the US government's
dollar policy after Mr Bush appeared to hint last week that he would be
happy to see the dollar slide. 
"[Bush] said when he appointed me, when we sat on the stage together in
Austin, that I was his economic spokesman. So don't listen to anybody else,"
Mr O'Neill said. Foreign exchange markets have been confused in recent days
as Mr Bush has said the market should determine the dollar's level while Mr
O'Neill has been insisting that there has been no change to the government's
strong dollar policy. 
The strength of the US currency is adding to pressures on American companies
struggling to return to profitability following the downturn which began
last autumn. 
Concerns that the second quarter results season will be even worse than the
first led to the Dow Jones industrial average sliding 100 points in early
trading yesterday. Hi-tech sector leaders such as Microsoft, which was down
almost $2, and Hewlett-Packard, which lost 78 cents, drove the decline in
the blue-chip index. 
"There's a lot of worry out there, as more earnings start coming in, that
they're going to show a trend of a slow, weak business environment with no
immediate prospects of turning up," said Peter Coolidge, a senior equity
trader at Brean Murray. 
The US Federal Reserve has cut interest rates six times since the start of
the year, but despite the cautious optimism expressed by G8 leaders at this
weekend's summit in Genoa, the US economy shows few signs of bouncing back. 
Investor optimism sank to its lowest level in almost five years in July,
according to a poll by brokerage UBS PaineWebber and Gallup. 
"Investors have been hearing a lot about Federal Reserve policy and interest
rate cuts and how they are going to help portfolios and the economy," said
Tracy Eichler, an investment strategist at UBS PaineWebber. 
"What investors need to realise is that it usually takes six months to hit
the economy." 

Genoa raid was police 'revenge' 
Inquest Assault on HQ denounced as authorised butchery 

Special report: Globalisation 
Rory Carroll in Genoa
Guardian 
Tuesday July 24, 2001 
The bloodsoaked police raid on the headquarters of the Genoa protesters at
the weekend yesterday prompted the accusation yesterday that the state had
undermined its legitimacy by sanctioning brutality. 
Evidence emerged that the assault early on Sunday morning, in which 61
people were injured, had been a vendetta by police officers seeking revenge
for the rioting at the G8 summit. 
Last night the parliamentary opposition demanded a commission of inquiry
into the policing of the summit and the resignation of the interior
minister, Claudio Scajola. 
In a raucous debate, Mr Scajola and the prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi,
tried to distance themselves from the raid on the headquarters of the Genoa
Social Forum. 
To guffaws of disbelief, they insisted that they did not know in advance
that 200 police officers would attack the forum. More than a dozen of the 93
people arrested were carried out on stretchers. 
"A pack of lies, responded Vittorio Agnoletto, a spokesman for the forum.
"It was authorised butchery." 
Political analysts questioned the government's claim that the head of the
police force, Gianni De Gennaro, would have given the order without
consulting the interior minister. 
The forum has called for protests at police stations throughout the country
today against what it called vicious, deceitful tactics. 
An anarchist website warned of violent revenge for the death of Carlo
Giuliani, 23, who was shot by police. 
A letter bomb exploded in Verona, causing no injuries. Another device sent
to Genoa's prefect was intercepted and defused. 
For the duration of the raid Italy had been a state without law, said Fausto
Bertinotti, leader of the Refounded Communists. "In these days things have
happened which in my life I have never seen - never." 
An interior ministry source admitted that the raid had turned into a revenge
attack by police venting their frustration after two days of failing to
control looting and thuggery. 
Officially the operation has been called a success. The officers who stormed
the two schools in which the forum had its headquarters found two Molotov
cocktails, a nail bomb, two sledgehammers, a pickaxe and 12 penknives. 
The 93 who were arrested may be charged with criminal association,
possession of explosives, resisting arrest and damage to public property. 
A forum spokesman said the sledgehammers and pickaxe, which were covered in
dust, had been left by workmen who had not yet finished building the school.

The knives were needed to open tins of food, and the homemade bombs were
probably planted, he added. 
But yesterday magistrates questioned why the carabinieri, the police force
which is part of the army, had used inexperienced teenage conscripts. 
The intelligence services allegedly terrified the conscripts with warnings
that packets of HIV-infected blood infected would be thrown. 
A cameraman said that protesters, fearing police ambushes, begged television
crews to escort them to the railway station. 
But the protesters may have lost the public relations battle. An opinion
poll by Datamedia suggested that most Italians believed the police were too
tolerant. 

Police hit hard at core of dissent 
Demonstrators denounce violent raid on protest nerve centre

Special report: globalisation 
John Vidal in Genoa
Guardian 
Monday July 23, 2001 
The police raid began at midnight on Saturday with the city of Genoa calm,
the streets clear of protesters, and the barricades and burnt out cars
cleared away. An estimated 200 police in 40 vans blocked off Cesari Battisti
Street. One group headed for the Diaz secondary school which had been loaned
to the Genoa Social Forum, organisers of the protest, and was being used as
a dormitory by about 50 people. The other group headed for the building
opposite - the forum's headquarters and administrative centre. 
Markus, a 25-year-old social worker from near Berlin, was asleep on the
floor of the school. He woke, he says, to shouts and screams, doors being
broken down and the police charging in. "There were no anarchists there. We
were all peaceful and non-violent. 
"They burst into the room wearing black masks, started throwing things at
us. They smashed computers and started beating people in their bags. Five of
us rushed upstairs and climbed out of a window and then down a drainpipe.
But the police were there. 
"They told us to lie on the ground and then they started beating us with
truncheons and kicking. Three of them beat me for two, perhaps three,
minutes. I though they were going to kill us. Two of my friends were very
badly hurt in the head; there was blood everywhere." 
Fifty-one people, none of them police, were injured, 31 were taken to
hospital, and three required surgery. 
Amnesty
Yesterday morning, as Amnesty International agreed to investigate, the
school had pools of dried blood over its floors and walls. 
Within an hour of the raid, leaders of the Genoa Social Forum, MPs, lawyers
and doctors had gathered outside the building. 
"We saw people being led out with broken legs, arms and noses. There was
blood everywhere. One man was lying on the ground in a pool of it. The
protesters, just kids, were trembling in fear", said Francesco Martones,
Green Party senator for Genoa. 
Vittorio Agnoletto, leader of the Social Forum, said: "They refused
everybody access. They didn't want us to see what was happening. They
refused to show us their legal authorisation to enter the building. There
was no one in authority to talk to. They beat us, too. 
"We went to the hospital. I am a doctor. I saw injuries consistent with
intent to administer as much pain as possible. The director said that the
police had taken it [the hospital] over. He said two people had traumas and
compression, one man was paralysed down one side of his body and two men
were still unconscious. The nurses, everyone, were very scared." 
Meanwhile, on the other side of the street, dozens of policemen had gone
into the Social Forum's headquarters. "There were not many people there,"
said Francis, an Englishman. "They came in swearing, broke computers. We put
our hands up and tried to hide." 
Brutality
A spokesman for the Social Forum said: "They took away documents, witness
statements of police brutality, lists of lawyers, video evidence collected
against people for the violence in the past few days." 
Yesterday the police claimed that the school building had been occupied by
the "black block" of protesters known to have caused much of the damage in
Genoa for the past three days. But at an impromptu press conference they
refused to answer allegations of brutality or illegality. "We have no
comment", a spokesman said. 
Mr Agnoletto said: "We believe that this was a well organised attempt to
discredit the protests against world leaders. There were clearly two
operations - one to suggest to the public that they were trying to crack
down on the black block, the other to make sure they took away incriminating
evidence against themselves." 
Yesterday protesters still in town were furious. "Why did the police not go
to the places everybody knew the black block was camping? They could have
come into either of our buildings peacefully and without problem, yet they
chose not to go after the perpetrators of real violence. This is not my
country. I don't want to see this," said Maria, an Italian student at Rome
university. "I am ashamed of what has happened." 

Protesters hail their martyr 
Special report: globalisation 
Rory Carroll in Genoa
Guardian 
Monday July 23, 2001 
Two days after he was shot dead by police, Carlo Giuliani was yesterday fast
becoming a martyr for the anti-globalisation movement, hailed as an
idealist, not a thug. 
Posters of his corpse were distributed throughout Genoa, while the
bloodstained spot in Piazza Alimonda where he fell was turned into a shrine.

Leaders of peaceful protest groups, initially uncertain about praising a man
who attacked police, joined in tributes which described the 23-year-old as a
model of compassion and commitment. 
In a peaceful demonstration on Saturday thousands marched wearing black
armbands, which were visible again yesterday. 
A police officer shot Giuliani as he prepared to throw a fire extinguisher
through the windscreen of a police Land Rover. 
Italy's interior minister said the officer who fired the shot, a 20-year-old
conscript who has been hospitalised for shock, acted in self-defence but
prosecutors are considering manslaughter charges. 
Carlo's father, Giuliano, a trade union official, branded the shooting a
homicide but said the killer was also a victim of a situation which
spiralled out of control. "Have pity for him." 
Some protesters privately said Giuliani, a beggar with a criminal record for
violence and carrying weapons, should not be held up as a model. Others said
that was a police smear. 

'This movement is unstoppable' 
Leaders see demonstrations growing, despite the violence

Special report: globalisation 
John Vidal in Genoa
Guardian 
Monday July 23, 2001 
Protest leaders yesterday were adamant that the death of a young man and
some of the worst riots in Europe for years would not stop people taking to
the streets against world leaders or global bodies. 
"This movement is unstoppable now in both rich and poor countries. We have
seen nothing yet", said French farmers' leader Jose Bové. 
Three million people are believed to have demonstrated against globalisation
in the two years since the Seattle world trade talks. The Genoa social forum
attracted more than 700 groups from 100 countries to protest against the G8.

But the "movement" is not yet considered intellectually or politically
mature. Half its influences come from developing countries, which do not
always share the agendas of groups in the north. "It is quite possible that
it could split. People are working together to unite the agendas but it is
not clear where it is all leading," said Laurent Jesover of Attac in France,
a network seeking financial reform. 
The rapid coming together of global networks, coalitions and non-government
organisations could be strengthened as trade unions and fringe political
parties add organisational weight. "We are seeing for the first time in a
generation a real shared agenda emerging," said one Greek trade union
leader. "Only three years ago we would never have imagined working with
environmental groups, people from Africa and America." 
Attempts to hold meetings behind even greater security or in remote places
are not expected to pose problems to protesters. The internet, especially,
has enabled information to be shared very rapidly. 
But violence is seen as a problem. Last week several British groups,
including Oxfam and Drop the Debt, withdrew from one of the Genoa marches
for fear of being associated with violence. It is a particular problem for
groups who rely on their public image for income. 


Men in black behind chaos 
Hardliners plan 'actions' away from main protesters

Special report: globalisation 
Rory Carroll and John Vidal in Genoa, John Hooper in Berlin, David Pallister
and Owen Bowcott
Guardian 
Monday July 23, 2001 
An international network of hardline, anarchist groups, including activists
from Germany and the UK, spent months planning attacks on property and
violent clashes with police in Genoa. 
Calling themselves the Black Block, they regard the police as "guard dogs
for the rich", and banks as legitimate targets for anti-capitalist actions.
They wear black, along with masks to preserve their anonymity. 
They communicate through internet chat groups and websites. In Genoa,
members persuaded local anarchists to guide them through the maze of
medieval lanes, giving them an edge over police commanders not native to the
city. 
Another tactic was not to put on black clothing, such as hoods or scarves,
until the just before their attack. 
The term "black block" was already in use when gangs ran amok during the
anti-globalisation protests outside the World Trade Organisation meeting in
Seattle in 1999. Since then it has been applied to the highly organised
groups who plan "actions" separately from mainstream protesters and have no
contact with them. 
Most of the black block in Genoa came from Germany, Italy, France and the
Basque region in Spain. Few, if any, are believed to have been arrested. 
For more than two hours on Friday, and again on Saturday, groups of more
than 100 black-clad anarchists burned buildings, ransacked shops and
attacked banks with crowbars and scaffolding. One group paraded with black
flags and drums, attacking camera crews and reporters, smashing their
equipment and tearing up their notebooks. 
Other anarchist groups and anti-globalisation protesters are suspicious
about the black block's origins. In Italy, the Green party senator for
Genoa, Francesco Martone, alleged that there was a history of collusion
between the police and neo-fascists to discredit the left. "There is
evidence that they have worked together to infiltrate the genuine
protesters," he said. 
Video evidence collected by protesters and the independent media suggests
that men in black were seen getting out of police vans near protest marches.
They were noted for never attacking the police or the steel wall around the
red zone of the city. 
An Italian communist MP, Luigi Malabarba, said yesterday that during the
riot on Friday night, "I saw groups of German and French people dressed as
demonstrators in black with iron bars inside the police station near the
Piazza di Kennedy. Draw your own conclusions." 
The black block insists that it is part of the mainstream anti-capitalist
movement. A statement released in Genoa said: "We do not submit helplessly
to the politics of the powerful. We have come to enter militantly the red
zone and to stop the G8 meeting." 
The block's objective, as described on its main US website, is to "provide
solidarity in the face of a repressive police state and to convey an
anarchist critique of whatever is being protested that day". 
Its origins may lie in the earlier German autonomist movement, one of the
anarchist coalitions to emerge from the wreckage of the Baader-Meinhof
group. 
Another German group which advocated confrontation in Genoa was FAU, or the
Free Workers' Union, an anarcho-syndicalist trades union. Its website
declares: "The Lords of the World are set to be protected by 18,000 police
and 3,000 soldiers. At least 100,000 people, though, will try to spice up
their soup." 

Bush, Putin link shield to arms cuts 
Special report: globalisation
Special report: Russia
Special report: George Bush's America 
Ewen MacAskill in Genoa
Guardian 
Monday July 23, 2001 
The US president, George Bush, and his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin,
moved yesterday towards a surprise compromise over Washington's plan to
build a new missile defence shield and scrap the 1972 anti-ballistic missile
treaty. 
The two agreed to tie the national missile defence system (NMD) to a
reduction in their stockpiles of offensive strategic missiles. 
Mr Putin has regularly expressed hostility towards NMD and warned that
unilateral abandonment by the US of the ABM treaty, which helped to maintain
peace during the cold war, could begin another arms race. 
Mr Bush, who met Mr Putin in Genoa after the G8 summit ended, has said
repeatedly that the missile shield is intended for protection not against
Russia but against "rogue" states such as North Korea and Iraq. 
Mr Putin said Mr Bush's offer to tie NMD to offensive weapons was unexpected
and he was not ready at this stage to talk about how much stockpiles might
be reduced. "But a joint striving exists," he said. 
Mr Putin has suggested in the past that 1,500 strategic missiles each, or
even less, would be a sufficient arsenal for each side. The US has 7,000 at
present. 
Most European countries, particularly France, have openly criticised Mr Bush
for pushing ahead with the missile programme and for threatening to scrap
the ABM treaty. But the prime minister, Tony Blair, anxious not to offend Mr
Bush, said the best approach was to wait and see whether the missile plan
proved practical and whether Mr Bush and Mr Putin could reach a compromise
on the ABM treaty. 
The US-Russian statement said: "We agreed that major changes in the world
require concrete discussions of both offensive and defensive systems. We
already have some strong and tangible points of agreement. We will shortly
begin intensive consultations on the interrelated subjects of offensive and
defensive systems." 
Mr Bush, at a press conference after their talks, said: "We have agreed to
find common ground if possible. I believe we'll come up with an accord.
We'll work hard toward one." 
Mr Bush suggested it might be possible, by way of compromise, to meet Mr
Putin's objections to the scrapping of the ABM treaty by negotiating a new
treaty. 
He described himself and Mr Putin as "young leaders who are interested in
forging a more peaceful world". 
After they first met in Slovenia last month, Mr Bush said the meeting had
been cordial, but Mr Putin later criticised Mr Bush over the missile plan. 
Mr Putin threatened that if the US abandoned the ABM treaty, Russia would
consider all other nuclear weapons treaties to be void too. 
He has also suggested that Moscow could fit multiple warheads to its single
warhead missiles, a dangerous form of escalation. 
Asked about that threat yesterday, Mr Putin said that if the new talks went
well, "we might not ever need to look at that option, but it's one of our
options". 

Fresh violence grips Genoa 
The globalisation debate - Observer special

Special report: globalisation
John Vidal and Ewen MacAskill 
Observer 
Sunday July 22, 2001 
Hundreds of specialist Italian anti-terrorist police, backed by armoured
personnel carriers, fought running battles against masked anarchists for the
second day of the G8 summit in Genoa. 
The anarchists were seeking revenge for the death of one of their number -
shot dead by police on Friday as he attempted to attack a police car with a
fire extinguisher. 
The new battles in the historic city came as more than 100,000 largely
peaceful protesters staged a sombre and nervous march. The self- stewarded
marchers - campaigning on issues from debt relief to fair trade - sought to
distance themselves from the worst violence in 18 months of
anti-globalisation protests. The violence has overshadowed both the summit
and the message of the majority of protesters. 
Many of the marchers chanted 'murderers' and 'assassins' at police as they
passed the spot where 23-year-old Carlo Giuliani had been shot in the head. 
Police used tear gas to push back several thousand anarchists who had moved
ahead of the main group of marchers. 
Protesters who hurled paving stones and firebombs at riot police 'were 500
people in a peaceful march of thousands,' said 31-year-old demonstrator
Simona Tatarini. 'They had clubs and firebombs - what were we supposed to do
to get them out of the march?' 
Yesterday the Corso Torino, the main route of the march, was a scene of
devastation with shops and offices wrecked, and cash machines pulled from
walls daubed with graffiti. The scale of the devastation - estimated to have
cost the city millions of pounds - has thrown into doubt the future of
international summitry. Despite assurances from leaders inside the summit
centre that they would continue to meet in future, few cities are likely to
be keen to welcome them. 
Evidence emerged that extremist groups from Germany, Italy and France had
travelled to Genoa to escalate the violence. Among them, the German
anarchist group, the FAU, which has a long history of street violence. 
Meanwhile the chief prosecutor for the city, Francesco Meloni, said the
police officer who shot dead Giuliani would face an investigation to
determine whether murder or manslaughter charges should be brought, or
whether he acted in self-defence. It was revealed yesterday that Giuliani
had a police record. 
Despite the widespread international horror at the killing of Giuliani, the
conduct of the police was defended by Tony Blair, who blamed a minority of
demonstrators 'bent on violence'. 
Blair insisted that the G8 leaders should be able to meet to do their work,
despite calls by Italian papers and local people to suspend the summit. 
'To criticise the Italian police and the Italian authorities for working to
make sure the security of the summit is right is, to me, to turn the world
upside down,' Blair said yesterday. 
'Of course, it is a tragedy that someone has lost their life. But it's very
difficult for the police when they are faced with people throwing petrol
bombs and using extreme forms of violence.' 
Yesterday leaders of the Genoa Social Forum, the umbrella group of 700
protesting organisations, also began its own inquest, accusing the
government of colluding with the anarchists, of provoking violence and of
justifying the massive attack made on several marches. 
No one in Genoa including the police, doubts that the anarchists started
Europe's worst riots in years but the leaders of the forum respect that
their 'movement' against globalisation cannot now control its own people. 
'It is a young movement, it is very naive at times, it is idealistic. It
must learn to defend itself from the nihilists and seek protection from the
state,' says Claudio Martini, president of the Tuscan region. 
'How can it?,' asks Jose Bove, leader of the confederation of French
peasants.'Yesterday the state organised the provocation. It is scared the
response will be bigger and bigger, we are not afraid.' 
But the demonstrators are scared of splitting what they call the global
movement developing so rapidly against the G8 world bodies and corporations.

In the past year it is estimated that more than three million in more than
20 coun tries, north and south, have taken to the streets to oppose
'neo-liberal policies' of most governments. Almost everyone has ended in
tears. Four people have now been killed. 
There is broad consensus that if splits occur they will be over the
violence. 
Yesterday Drop the Debt, Oxfam and other British charities withdrew from the
march against debt which they had intended to lead as much as anything they
feared being associated with the violence. 
But others, notably older communists and socialists, were yesterday
underlining the need to confront the state even more by whatever means
possible and were refusing to condemn publicly anyone who retaliated against
the police. 
'We are being split by ideologies,' said ecologist deputy editor Paul
Kingsnorth. 'There is a massive power struggle going on. People must
recognise the potential for violence within the movement. There is an
emerging, vibrant group, putting forward radical ideas about how movement
should develop, but for other who just want to seize power and take it over.

The next focus of protestors will be the meeting of the World Bank and IMF
in Washington at the end of September which some fear could see the biggest
demonstrations in the US since the Vietnam war. 
Related special reports
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Comment and analysis
19.07.2001: Do they protest too much?
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18.07.2001: Summits, showmanship and saving face in Italy 
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The G8 summit explained
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Useful links
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Squall magazine 

The city burns, a young man lies dead... 
... and around him the battle rages on

Special report: globalisation 
John Vidal in Genoa
Guardian 
Saturday July 21, 2001 
In front of me a young man lies dead under a white sheet. His body is
surrounded by 80 police officers in gasmasks, with riot shields, truncheons
and guns. Not one looks more than 20 years old - the age, it is said, of the
dead man. 
They shift nervously. No one knows exactly what happened. A doctor says the
man has two head wounds. One looks like the wound from a stone, she says.
The other, in his cheek, could be that of a bullet. 
He has already become the unknown protester. One demonstrator says he heard
a gunshot. Another says he saw the body driven over by a police van. All
that is certain is that it happened at the height of one of the worst riots
that Europe has known in decades. 
The youth lies dead and Genoa is burning, a city in which Tony Blair and his
fellow leaders of the G8 group of the world's richest countries are meeting
behind 13ft steel barricades protected by 18,000 police officers. 
There is a temporary silence as an ambulance comes to take away the body,
and both sides contemplate what has happened. But just 200 yards away, on a
side street, eight officers have cornered another young man fleeing from
them. They pile in with truncheons and he takes 20 blows to his head and
body. Amazingly, he gets up, bloodied, staggering and disoriented. A minute
later he collapses. The volunteer medic teams rush over to him. 
The helicopters buzz 75ft overhead, and back in the square the shocked crowd
is furious. They chant "assassins, assassins" at the police. 
This was one of most beautiful cities in Europe. Now stones and rubbish
litter the streets. Shops, banks, super markets, post offices, garages and
other businesses are destroyed. All around is desolation, fury and
destruction. 
Fires still burn round Brignole rail station. Police vans, armoured
personnel carriers, water cannon and protesters rush through the town.
Teargas is fired in one direction as the stones fly in another. Nobody knows
quite what has happened or where trouble will flare next. The only certain
thing is that there have been many injuries - 93 by the official tally.
Behind me a park of 20 cars has been torched. The air swells with smoke,
teargas and anger. 
The accusations of overzealous policing and violent demonstrators now fly.
Questions are also asked about whether city-based G8 summits like this can
ever be held again. But this is a complex situation. Not all protesters or
all police have been intent on wreaking havoc. 
Up to 2,000 anarchists pulled the trigger for the violence. They are mainly
German, with some Italians, French and other Europeans. Some are British
members of the Animal Liberation Front, scrawling "ALF" on the walls. 
Of the 35,000 to 40,000 demonstrators here, all but that small minority of
anarchists have signed up to the principle of peaceful protest. At meeting
points protesters are searched to ensure no one is carrying sticks or
stones. But the activists say the way the police reacted to the anarchists
and ambushed peaceful marchers has inflamed thousands. 
The Genoa Social Forum, with its 700 groups from across the world committed
to non-violence, negotiated with the police and is devastated. "This is
unacceptable," says a spokesman. "We have been provoked by a level of state
and anarchist violence that was unimaginable. The G8 and the government must
be blamed, but we must accept our share of responsibility." 
In Via Tolemead, confrontation becomes inevitable the moment the police rush
forward to grab the plastic barricades of one of the marchers. The crowd
behind surges forward and three people fall. The police beat a man. The
protesters surge forward and gain 20 yards. Suddenly the police are in
retreat. A spokesman for the protesters comes forward to negotiate: "We had
agreed this route," he says. The police retreat again. 
But now some of the anarchists have started stoning the police from a side
street. A van of carabinieri stalls and the anarchists launch themselves on
it, as if on a wounded animal. In minutes they have broken all its windows.
The five policemen inside open the doors and run for it. The van is torched,
to cheers. 
All day there has been mayhem. Sticks, stones, teargas, fireworks, flares,
bottles and truncheons have been thrown back and forth. Barricades of wood
and metal have been set alight under a bridge. It is now 7.30pm. In the
distance protesters and the police are beating their drums under a pall of
smoke. The battle for the city has lasted eight hours and may go on
sporadically all night. 
In one square, the anarchists still rule. A dozen have broken into a small
supermarket, ransacked shelves and are handing out ice-cream and wine. They
are dangerously drunk. 
One, a German, snatches my notebook, spits in my face, raises his stick. He
looks no more than 20. His comrades strut around behind black flags and
drums, smashing and burning everything, turning on anyone in their path. 

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19.07.2001: Do they protest too much?
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The G8 summit explained
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Official G8 Genoa site
City of Genoa
Genoa Social Forum 
One World 
Globalise Resistance
Reclaim the Streets 
Squall magazine

The activists and their aims 
Special report: globalisation 
Guardian 
Saturday July 21, 2001 
There are four main groups of protesters in Genoa: 

Anarchists 
Divided into the "black block" (international) and "blue block" (some
Italian), most are autonomous, unaccountable, small in numbers and unwilling
to divulge tactics. Prepared to attack people and property The disobedients
Ya Basta and Tute Bianche, young communists, "cobas", people from social
centres. Non-violent but maintain the right to self-defence 
Radical reformists 
These make up the majority of the 700 groups and networks who are part of
the Genoa Social Forum umbrella group organising the protests. They include
Attac, a collective of groups linking NGOs, newspapers and unions from 12
countries, international socialists, charities, debt campaigners, third
world farmers' groups and Globalise Resistance, a group set up by the
British Socialist Workers party. Non-violent 
Old guard
Unions, church groups, cultural organisations, pacifists and Catholic
networks. Non-violent

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19.07.2001: Do they protest too much?
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18.07.2001: Summits, showmanship and saving face in Italy 
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19.07.2001: 18,000 police and no protesters in sight (2mins 03) 
Other resources
The G8 summit explained
Weblog special: the G8 summit
Interactive guide: How does missile defence work?
Genoa: the story in links 
Useful links
Official G8 Genoa site
City of Genoa
Genoa Social Forum 
One World 
Globalise Resistance
Reclaim the Streets 
Squall magazine


Protester killed in summit chaos 
Special report: globalisation 
Ewen MacAskill and Larry Elliot in Genoa
Guardian 
Saturday July 21, 2001 
The Italian city of Genoa was in the grip of shock and chaos last night
after the worst-ever anti-globalisation riots saw one young protester shot
dead by police and at least one other seriously injured, forcing world
leaders to rethink the future of their annual summit. 
As leaders of the G8 group of the world's richest nations began their talks
behind a ring of steel, bloody clashes escalated during a day of running
battles between 20,000 armed police and tens of thousands of protesters,
many of them throwing firebombs and cobblestones dug up from the streets. 
The scale of the violence dwarfed even the first anti-capitalist
confrontation in Seattle 18 months ago. 
Italian police, who warned in advance they were prepared to take tough
action to prevent the kind of disturbances seen in Gothenburg last month,
used highly aggressive policing tactics, including water cannon, teargas and
clubs, to keep the violent protesters from breaching the security fences set
up to protect the so-called red zone thrown round Genoa's port district. 
Forty-six protesters and 31 police officers were hurt, and 39 people were
arrested. 
Witness accounts of the fatality were conflicting, but it appeared last
night that the young man had been shot and then run over by a police
armoured vehicle. His body, covered by a white sheet, lay in a pool of blood
while clashes continued around it. Protesters chanted "assassins, assassins"
at the police. 
A 25-year-old student from Turin, who gave his name only as Giuseppe, said:
"I was about 25 yards away when I heard a shot. There had been trouble going
on. A police jeep was reversing and some guys ran towards the jeep. They
were all round it and trying to smash the windows, then I heard a shot, and
people saying 'stop, stop'." 
Throughout the day small gangs of anarchists - accused by protest organisers
of hijacking a peaceful demonstration - made repeated assaults on the
13ft-high steel fence topped with barbed wire. The barricade was seen as
symbolising the way in which the G8 leaders are divorced from their
citizenry. 
In one of a number of sorties about 200 black-clad people smashed windows at
a bank, and protesters hurled com puters and other equipment out of nearby
offices. An automatic teller window was smashed and cars and bins were set
on fire. 
Police said the red zone had remained intact. But politicians, shocked by
the scale of the rioting, were assessing the cost of the security operation.

The Italian president, Carlo Azeglio Chiampi, said he was shocked and
saddened by the death, and pleaded with demonstrators "to immediately cease
this blind violence". The Italian prime minister, Sil vio Berlusconi,
speaking before news of the first death broke, said there must never again
be a summit like Genoa. The security arrangements had brought the city to a
standstill, with the red zone reduced to a ghost town. 
The G8 comprises Britain, the US, France, Germany, Japan, Canada, Italy and
Russia. It has been meeting every year since 1975 and, while there were
peaceful protests by debt campaigners in Birmingham in 1998 and Cologne the
following year, this was the first time its summer gathering has been
targeted. 
The leaders spent the day discussing the weakness of the world economy, the
need for a new round of trade talks and plans for a new global fund to help
fight Aids, malaria and TB in developing countries. 
Tony Blair said: "It would be good to have a dialogue with people on issues
like globalisation but the problem is these demonstrators do not want a
dialogue, they want to storm the building and create an outrage." The prime
minister said he and his colleagues were addressing many of the concerns
expressed by the protesters, in particular climate change and global
poverty. 
Although Mr Blair believes there is a future for summits, the present format
may have to be abandoned. There is a push for summits to be held in
permanent locations, where security can be virtually guaranteed, or in
capital cities better geared for handling riots. 
The US president, George Bush, also criticised the protesters, saying that
while they claimed to represent the poor they embraced policies that "lock
people into poverty and that is unacceptable". 
Clare Short, the international development secretary, said she sympathised
with the peaceful protesters at Genoa but even they should think again. "It
costs a fortune to get everybody flying into these summits," she said. "The
money people spend coming from the rich world to protest on behalf of the
poor could be directed into doing more in the developing world. 
"The violent protesters are both nasty in what they do but also they are
confusing international debate, because they are trying to destroy all our
global institutions." 
The Genoa Social Forum, the umbrella group which led the peaceful protest,
said the violence was unacceptable: "We have been provoked by a level of
state and anarchist violence that was unimaginable and unexpected. The G8
and the Italian government must be blamed, but we must accept our share of
responsibility." 

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Genoa: the story in links 
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Genoa Social Forum 
One World 
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Response 
Italy at loggerheads over who is to blame 
Angry calls for premier's resignation

Special report: globalisation 
Rory Carroll in Rome
Guardian 
Saturday July 21, 2001 
Italy reeled in shock and anger last night as controversy raged over who was
to blame for the death and injuries in Genoa. 
Government ministers pledged support for the police in television interviews
which turned into shouting matches with opposition politicians, who
condemned the policing as botched and heavy-handed. 
The prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, and the president, Carlo Azeglio
Ciampi, appeared together to express sadness and plead for calm. 
The interior minister, Claudio Scajola, issued a statement confirming the
dead demonstrator, an Italian named as Carlo Giuliani, had been shot and
that the policeman who fired had "presumably" been injured and acted out of
self-defence. 
Opposition politicians called on Mr Scajola to resign over what some called
a national shame, but cabinet colleagues rushed to his defence. 
"The death of the demonstrator cannot be blamed on those who held the
summit, nor the police," said Renato Ruggiero, foreign minister. 
Gianfranco Fini, deputy prime minister, went further: "Genoa today was put
under iron and fire by organised groups that had no other intention than
provoking trouble." He cited the principle of legitimate self-defence. 
Fausto Bertinotti, leader of the Refounded Communists, said the security
operation had been absurd and excessive. 
Television networks interrupted scheduled programmes and extended news
coverage to carry live coverage of the riots. 
Studio discussions turned heated, with politicians visibly shaken, when
photos of the killing flashed across the screens. 
Luca Casarini, leader of the Tute Bianche (White Overalls) protest group,
accused the authorities of sentencing his activists to death. "They fired on
us while we were demonstrat ing peacefully." A priest in a wheelchair in a
Genoa piazza punched the air in rage and said the the government had sinned.
The archbishop of Genoa, Dionigi Tettamanzi, pleaded for dialogue. 
Demonstrators in hospital casualty wards accused police of not
distinguishing between the peaceful and the violent. 
Mainstream opposition leaders said the centre-right government would have to
take political responsibility for the decision of police to use live rounds.

Ministers responded that it was the centre-left which chose Genoa for a
summit when it was in power. 
First editions of newspapers splashed the photo of a Carabinieri Land-Rover
reversing over the dead demonstrator, beneath headlines branding the summit
the day of blood. 
Analysts agreed that Mr Berlusconi's reputation would suffer, since he had
staked his personal credibility on the summit's success. 
Italian television showed police, minutes after the killing, shouting at
protesters: "Pieces of shit! It is you who killed him!" 
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19.07.2001: 18,000 police and no protesters in sight (2mins 03) 
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Genoa: the story in links 
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City of Genoa
Genoa Social Forum 
One World 
Globalise Resistance
Reclaim the Streets 
Squall magazine 
5.45pm update 
Protester shot dead in Genoa riot 
* Thousands on streets
* Leaders begin talks 
* Global health fund announced

Audio: John Vidal in Genoa
Special report: globalisation 
Simon Jeffery
Guardian Unlimited 
Friday July 20, 2001 
An anti-globalisation demonstrator was killed today after being shot in the
head by an Italian paramilitary trooper during riots close to the G8 summit
venue in Genoa. 
According to reports he was run over by a police jeep after being hit by at
least two bullets. 
The victim - his identity as yet unconfirmed - threw a fire extinguisher at
a police van and the trooper retaliated with gunfire. 
The body lay in a pool of blood, covered by a white sheet. 
Police are also using tear gas and water cannons against protesters as the
summit of the seven richest industrial nations and Russia opens amid the
worst rioting in Europe for decades. 
Trouble broke out shortly before lunch when demonstrators were denied
permission to march to a prohibited area. They then smashed windows and
turned over rubbish bins for ammunition to use against the police. 
Officers with riot shields advanced down a side street off the Via Giuseppe
Casareggi, about a mile from the summit venue, and released tear gas as the
demonstrators hurled bricks and bottles at them. 
During the clashes, an Italian nurse and a British television producer were
clubbed by police batons, witnesses said. A city centre bank was smashed,
cobble stones pulled up and computers hurled out of office windows. 
The violence soon spread as a small group of activists broke away to
confront police just outside the security fence ringing the old part of the
city - renamed the red zone - where the eight leaders are meeting in the
14th-century Palazzo Ducale. Water cannons were fired at point blank range
from the other side of the barrier at demonstrators attempting to breach it.

Near a railway station in the city centre a sustained clash broke out when
police fired volleys of tear gas and charged into the ranks of protesters,
batons flailing in the air. 
Two miles away another group threw bottles and fire bombs at a jail, it not
being clear whether they were trying to break in or free prisoners. 
The Italian authorities have assembled almost 20,000 police and troops to
handle the protests. 
Inside the venue, the summit began with a working lunch followed by an
afternoon session attended by the leaders of the United States, Japan,
Germany, Britain, France, Italy and Canada - the old G7 that has held an
economic summit every year for almost three decades. 
Russia, the newest member of the club, is invited to join evening sessions
devoted to global development issues. 
One of the main targets of the demonstrations, the US president, George
Bush, landed in the city this morning. 
Mr Bush's rejection of the Kyoto protocol on global warming, support for
large oil companies, such as Exxon Mobil, and his missile defence plans have
angered many of the protesters. 
But he warned today that violent protests would do a disservice to the
impoverished masses of the world. 
He said that to follow the agenda suggested by the demonstrators would lock
the poor into poverty. "And that is unacceptable to the United States. Trade
is the best avenue for growth for all countries," he said. 
Since 1999, protesters have been shadowing meetings of the powerful around
the world to push their agenda, and some of those demonstrations, such as
Prague, Seattle, Gothenberg and now Genoa have turned violent. 
The Italian authorities set up border controls earlier this month to weed
out suspected troublemakers and erected the steel fence to block the way
through Genoa's steep, dark alleys toward the summit sites near the port. 
In a move that the world leaders hope will prove they are interested in the
needs of the poor, a new global health fund has been announced to combat
Aids. 
The US is also keen to counteract the impression that it has been isolated
because of the administration's rejection of the Kyoto protocol on global
warming and Mr Bush's plans for missile defence. The US secretary of state,
Colin Powell, has announced that America will have a substitute plan in time
for an October global warming conference sponsored by the UN. 
Other sessions will be dedicated to assessing vulnerable spots in the
current global economy, such as a potential US recession, the Japanese
downturn and threats to emerging economies. 
Approximately 5,000 people are reported to be involved in the current
clashes, out of a predicted 100,000 in the city who are expected to join the
main march tomorrrow. 
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19.07.2001: Do they protest too much?
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Interactive
Tour a city under siege 
Gallery
The Genoa riots in pictures 
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19.07.2001: 18,000 police and no protesters in sight (2mins 03) 
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The G8 summit explained
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Interactive guide: How does missile defence work?
Genoa: the story in links 
Useful links
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City of Genoa
Genoa Social Forum 
One World 
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Genoa: who are the protesters? 
Special report: globalisation 
Matthew Tempest, political correspondent 
Guardian Unlimited 
Friday July 20, 2001 
The British prime minister Tony Blair has dubbed them a "travelling circus
of anarchists", but very few of the 10,000 to 100,000 protesters intending
to demonstrate at the G8 meeting of the western industrialised nations in
the Italian port of Genoa this weekend would actually describe themselves as
"anarchists". 
Instead, the 700 or so protest groups from around the world will be made up
of trade unionists, anti-globalisation protesters, environmental
campaigners, arms trade demonstrators, Kyoto supporters, third world debt
agitators and a myriad of others. Probably including a few "official"
anarchists from Spain and Italy. 
Many more individuals will simply be at the conference of their own accord,
to show their mistrust of national governments standing up to multinational
corporations. 
The final number of demonstrators will depend largely on two things: how
many are turned away by the police force under Italy's new tycoon prime
minister Silvio Berlosconi, and who is doing the counting - police tallies
have a habit of halving the number of actual demonstrators. 
Here are some of the main protest groups going to Genoa this weekend, a list
which is far from exhaustive: 
World Revolution
* Rallying point for anarchists and communists from Sweden, Ukraine, Italy,
France, Spain and elsewhere. Does not reject violence as an option.
Connected to Ya Basta and the Zapatistas.

Wombles - white overalls movement building libertarian effective struggles 
* The white overalls, helmets and shin pads are a familiar sight from
Prague, Seattle and Gothenberg.

Globalise Resistance
* An umbrella group of anti-globalisation and environmental protestors. They
organised a train to take 450 demonstrators to Italy, which was cancelled
and then reinstated by SNCF following protests from UK and European
politicians.

Green party
* Representatives from Green parties across Europe will be at the Genoa
meeting, including Anna Bragga, Green party spokeswoman on globalisation,
who will be writing a demonstrator's diary for the Guardian Unlimited
politics site. 
Ms Bragga said: "When 19,000 children are dying every day as a direct result
of third world debt that could be cancelled tomorrow if only the G8 leaders
had the will, it's important to make a stand in Genoa."

Drop the Debt
* The successor organisation to Jubilee 2000 will be at Genoa, campaigning
to cancel the unpayable debts of the world's poorest nations. A petition
signed by 24m people will be presented to the G8 conference.

Ya Basta
* The Italian anarchists - the original model for Britain's Wombles - will
be on home ground for this battle. Their name translates as "Enough,
already!"

Destroy the International Monetary Fund
* Movement dedicated to abolishing the IMF by direct action. Links with the
Wombles. Were at Gothenburg, Seattle, Prague and Quebec.

Christian Aid
* The UK-based charity Christian Aid will be sending a delegation to Genoa
by double-decker bus, to highlight the further action needed on third world
debt.

Rising Tide
* Climate change group, campaigning against abandonment of the Kyoto
agreement, attending both the Bonn and Genoa conferences.

Special report: global warming

Audio
19.07.2001: John Vidal in Genoa

Special report
Globalisation

Useful links
Genoa - frequently asked questions

Related articles
19.07.2001: Bush flies in to face critics
20.07.2001: Let battle begin, in and outside the talks 
12pm update 
Eurozone 'close to recession' 
Special report: global recession
Mark Tran
Guardian Unlimited 
Thursday July 19, 2001 
One day after Alan Greenspan, the chairman of the Federal Reserve Board,
spelt out the fragile state of the American economy, a British thinktank
today warned that the eurozone is perilously close to entering recession
this year. 
In its latest report, the Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR)
in London, an independent thinktank, estimates that the eurozone's economic
growth will stall during the second half of 2001, while Germany, Europe's
leading economy, may already be in a technical recession. 
Its report came as the European central bank announced that it would leave
interest rates unchanged at 4.5%. Few economists had expected a cut this
week after the ECB president, Wim Duisenberg, had said two weeks ago that
rate levels were "appropriate for some time to come". 
The report underlines the dangers facing the global economy, with two of its
most important regions providing little impetus for world growth. The CEBR
said that the eurozone could even come close to delivering two consecutive
quarters of negative growth - the technical definition of a recession. 
Germany, Europe's largest economy, is likely to have shown negative growth
in the second quarter of 2001, while growth for the third quarter is
predicted to be close to zero and possibly negative - suggesting it may even
be in technical recession at present, according to the CEBR. 
Yesterday, Mr Greenspan provided little cheer for investors, saying that the
sharp downturn in the US economy is likely to continue, with limited signs
of improvement. The Fed chairman listed a raft of concerns, including
weakness in capital spending, the international slowdown and deterioration
in consumer spending. 
The new CEBR forecast indicates that Europe is poorly placed to pick up the
slack as the American economy falters. Its report comes on the day the
European central bank is set to announce its interest rate decision, with
analysts predicting that the cost of borrowing will stay on hold at 4.5%. 
Douglas McWilliams, CEBR chief executive and author of the report, said:
"The bank can't move either way at present. Eurozone inflation has fallen
from its 3.4% peak, but with the phasing out of national currencies likely
to lead to price rises, inflation is likely to stay above the Bank's target
of 2% until 2003. So it is difficult to cut rates. 
"But at the same time, with growth stalling and European unemployment
starting to rise, there will be substantial pressure on the bank to take
some action to boost demand." 
With weakness in the main economies around the world - Japan is also limping
along - analysts are gloomy. 
Allen Sinai, an economic forecaster with US thinktank Decision Economics,
said: "This is a serious contagion that left to its own dynamics, could
become a vicious cycle that feeds on itself." He puts the odds of a global
recession at 40%. 
The strains on the international economy will put special pressure on the G8
group of world leaders when they meet at the Genoa summit in Italy this
Friday. Political issues have had a tendency to overshadow economic ones,
but for once economics are set to dominate the agenda. 
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18.07.01: Taking a pounding
16.07.01, comment: The return of boom and bust
15.07.01: We're hurtling towards recession
Useful links
Centre for Economics and Business Research
Federal Reserve Board
European central bank 

Replace Nato by pan-European pact, Putin says 
Special report: Russia
Special report: European integration 
Amelia Gentleman in Moscow
Guardian 
Thursday July 19, 2001 
Vladimir Putin set out his vision for a pan-European security body which
would replace Nato and embrace Russia yesterday, and stressed that unless
Russia was allowed to join Nato he would like to see the alliance disbanded.

Mr Putin indicated that he viewed Nato as an anachronism and said he could
see no reason for its continued existence in the post-cold war world order. 
"We do not see it as an enemy. We do not view its existence as a tragedy.
But we also see no need for it," he said during his first large-scale
meeting with Moscow's press corps. "The Warsaw Pact no longer exists, the
Soviet Union is no more, but Nato continues to develop." 
Lasting European stability would not be created through Nato expansion, but
by the dismantling of Nato and its replacement with a "single security and
defence space in Europe". 
However, Mr Putin conceded that the rapid abolition of Nato was not
particularly likely, and proposed that another way of creating a united
European security zone would be to allow Russia into Nato's fold. "If we
fail to do this, we will continue to distrust each other." 
Initially ill at ease in any encounter with the press, most of Mr Putin's
previous meetings with the media had been small scale and carefully
stage-managed, with questions screened in advance by advisers. 
His decision to meet a huge group of some 500 Russian and international
journalists has been interpreted as a sign of growing confidence. 
The president's calm demeanour cracked only once when he was pressed about
human rights abuses in Chechnya. 
His admission that abuses had occurred earlier this month during operations
in Assinovskaya and Sernovodsk was extremely grudging. Instead he applauded
the military's action in the separatist state and said he had no intention
of changing his approach to the handling of the conflict. 
Darting between a range of topics, Mr Putin announced that he was against
the burial of Vladimir Lenin's mummified corpse as it could have a
profoundly destabilising effect on society. 
"This country lived under the communist monopoly for 70 years. Many people
connect their own lives with the name of Lenin," he said. "For them, Lenin's
burial would mean that they worshipped the wrong values, set themselves the
wrong tasks and that they lived their lives in vain. I'm trying not to do
anything to disturb civil peace and the consolidation of society." 
As the salvage operation to raise the Kursk submarine continued, Mr Putin
admitted that from a public relations standpoint his handling of last
summer's crisis would have been better if he had cut short his holiday in
the south of Russia to return to Moscow. 
In advance of his second meeting with George Bush at the G8 summit in Genoa,
Mr Putin complimented his American counterpart. 
"It seemed to me that he is a warm person, pleasant to talk to and I would
even say, perhaps I shouldn't say this, but he seemed to me a little
sentimental."