Sydney silences APEC protestors
Potential troublemakers have been blacklisted. Police were given extraordinary powers to stop and search people in the street. High school students were warned that their parents would be told if they skipped school to protest.
Officials in Australia — which prides itself on a long history of liberal democracy and respect for human rights — have gone to unusual lengths to make sure world leaders at a summit in Sydney this week are not bothered by unruly protests.
I liked this quote myself:
“The reason why we have this security clampdown in Sydney, the reason why people have been inconvenienced, is because people in the past have practiced and … are threatening violence,” Howard said this week.
To place the emphasis of violence on the protesters is to undermine the widespread violence necessary for APEC to exist and function. But to be a little more explicit with this violence, the police want a court order to change the route of the march to avoid protesters.
“If they are going to be idiots and want to take the police on, then they are going to face the consequences.”
So protestors are promised violence if they merely want to be noticed by those attending. Bush, Hu Jintao, Putin, and others can go about business and not for a second do they have to believe there is any diversity of opinion.
Explore posts in the same categories: who's fighting back, globalization, military/cops