Skip to content or view mobile version

Home | Mobile | Editorial | Mission | Privacy | About | Contact | Help | Security | Support

A network of individuals, independent and alternative media activists and organisations, offering grassroots, non-corporate, non-commercial coverage of important social and political issues.

Report on the WTO Conference Day One Protect Actions

reflex relay | 13.12.2005 21:40 | WTO Hong Kong 2005 | Globalisation | Social Struggles | World

Written by Little Wolf, Translated by Perspex
Source: InMedia HK
 http://www.inmediahk.net/public/article?item_id=84236&group_

Action Unity
Action Unity


The Sixth Ministerial WTO Conference officially opened today afternoon at 3pm at Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre (HKCEC). Anti-WTO demonstrators from various countries had staged several protest actions. Most protestors actively ensured the safety of these protest actions. However, at times, protestors could not stand the suppression from the police and had some confrontations. The police shot foam pepper sprays several times and used police rods to attack protestors. Yet, they think they were using “necessary violence” to counter the “non-peaceful” acts of protestors.

Peaceful March Encountered Water Bottles From Above

Around 200 South East Asian fishermen rode on two yachts to protest on the Victoria Harbour opposite HKCEC at 10am this morning. Yet, they were surrounded by six ships from the Marine Police. As the Marine Department did not allow yachts to approach HKCEC, four protesting fishermen jumped into the sea to swim. It didn’t result in any accidents.

At the same time, some protestors brought along protesting slogans and props to gather at the Victoria Park to start preparation for the Anti-WTO march in the afternoon. The Anti-WTO march set off from the Victoria Park, passed by Lok Hark Road and Gloucester Street and arrived at Wanchai cargo handling basin - the designated demonstration area which is quite far from the HKCEC. The police had set up barriers on the roadside. Up to 9,000 policemen were on standby. Shops in Wanchai received phone alerts earlier on to ask them to close their shops. Several schools in Wanchai were also closed today upon government’s request.

The front of the march set off from the Victoria Park at 2:10 p.m. The march was in order all the while, following the instructions from the organiser. It was similar to the carnival atmosphere like the Sunday march. In the march, slogans, songs, music and dance in different languages, as well as different national attires could be seen and heard. Many citizens observed the march on the way. There were no confrontation between citizens and the demonstrators. Around 3pm., People-Reporter witnessed some people threw down water bottles from high-rise buildings. The bottles were mainly targeted at South Korean protestors. Fortunately, they only made protestors’ clothes wet without any injuries. The marchers reached Wanchai cargo handling basin from around 3 pm to 4 pm. Yet, although the march had finished, the police continued to close certain streets.

The Police Shot Foam Pepper Spray at Demonstrators and People-Reporters

At 4pm-4:15pm, around 60 Anti-WTO demonstrators jumped into the Victoria Harbour at the Wanchai cargo handling basic and swam in protest. The swimming protestors included Koreans and Hong Kong people. They wore life jackets and some were holding Korean national flags. The marine police observed their action. Some protestors tried to swim towards HKCEC but were surrounded by the police and could not get onshore. They later returned the demonstration area.

At 4:20pm., some demonstrators brought out a wooden shrine at the Wanchai cargo handling basic and tried to light fire. They were treated with violence by the police and it led to confrontation of the two sides. The wooden shrine was in memorial of South Korean farmer Lee King-Hai who lost his life in protest of WTO. There were around 200 demonstrators as compared to 500 policemen there. The demonstrators only lighted fire on some paper and clothes but not on the wooden shrine. Yet, many policemen instantly rushed towards them, some killed off the fire, some pushed the demonstrators. And many policemen took out foam pepper spray to shoot at the demonstrators. Few policemen used police rods to hit the demonstrators. Demonstrators hit back with bamboo and empty plastic bottle. However, the police claimed that the demonstrators “used non-peaceful actions to confront the police line” and that the burning of the wooden shrine had “serious threat to public safety”.

Apart from the demonstrators, some reporters and people-reporters were also shot by foam pepper spray. Among them was people-reporter Little Bear, who need to wash with water instantly. According to Little Bear, she was not directly hit by the spray and she recovered in a few minutes after another people-reporter helped her to clean. But a reporter in front of Little Bear was hit more directly by the spray and showed a painful face. Also, Legislative Councillor Long Hair, some activists and foreigners were also hit by the foam pepper spray. The standoff lasted for 10 minutes. Later on, the leader of the gathering asked demonstrators to be calm.

Pepper Spray Again to Stop Slogan-Chanting

At 4:40pm., South Korean demonstrators were chanting slogans and hitting drums in the demonstration area. The police and anti-violence police, much reinforced now, tried to stop demonstrators from chanting slogans and had another standoff with demonstrators. The confrontation lasted for five to ten minutes. The police used foam pepper spray and police rod against demonstrators again. As observed by people-reporters, when the police shot the foam pepper spray, the demonstrators were not doing anything that may result in immediate danger or using extensive violence. Yet, there were suppressed by the police instantly.

The demonstrators started to leave the demonstration area at 5pm. Some left behind and sat down for gathering. When they were leaving, there were still many anti-violence policemen holding shields, police rods and even guns on standby. As observed by people-reporters, even though the sitting farmer-protestors did not have any actions, the policemen approached them with police rods from time to time. Some local people shouted at the police to hold back their police rods and not to trigger any confrontation themselves.

At 8pm., South Korean demonstrators discovered that among the 60 Koreans who jumped into the sea earlier on, five of them were missing after they came onshore. They suspected that the police had arrested them. The protestors were not satisfied with the arrangement by the police and negotiated with the police outside the demonstration area. Some protestors stay in the area to sing and dance. The police claimed that they did not arrest or detain any protestors and bring in anti-violence policemen to stand by. Later on, the police said the missing protestors were just sent to the aids station and promised to bring them back. People-reporter later confirmed that the missing protestors were sent to Wanchai Fire Service Department. South Korean consulate brought clothes to them.

Late on, the police brought the five missing protestors back to the meet up with other Korean protestors. Five Korean demonstrators were wearing in grey, hand in hand on barefoot. They left the Fire Service Department together and walked towards Wanchai north. They were surrounded by reporters on the way. When they met up with others again, it was 9:15pm. South Korean protestors were singing when they left Ma Zi Road and prepared to leave peacefully on couch. But some local protestors were angry at local television reporters at TVB who wore helmets during the live broadcast of the evening news. They asked the TVB reporters to take off their helmets as they viewed this as a way to discredit the protestors. These local protestors shouted “shameful” at the reporters to show their dissatisfaction at TVB News Department.

Police Claimed the Protestors Unpeaceful

Regarding the standoff at the designated demonstration area, WTO Ministerial Conference Chairperson John Tsang claimed the demonstrators used “non-peaceful methods” in their protest and felt “unfortunate and disappointed” about it. But he didn’t mention that the police used foam pepper spray to attack them. Chief Executive Donald Tsang said the police’s behaviour was “pretty good”.

Secretary for Security Ambrose Lee accused the protestors for “too radical” actions and “confronting the police lines”. He said the use of foam pepper spray by the police was “completely reasonable and legal”. He said the police handled the situation in a “tolerant and restraint manner” and “the police had the capability and determination to handle any sudden crises”. The police spokesperson further said the protestors used “non-peaceful ways” in their protest. He said they “should reflect on themselves”. In his eyes, the police was only “using the minimal and necessary violence” to handle them, as they considered the burning of the shrine could “have serious threat towards public safety”.

As observed by people-reporters, mainstream media like TVB, ATV, and MingPao instant news services focused on the lighting fire on the wooden shrine. But only some paper and clothes were lighted on fire but not the entire shrine. Apart from some people using empty plastic bottle and bamboos to hit back when attacked by shields, police rods and pepper spray from the police, the protesting South Korean farmers were pushing the fully equipped anti-violence policemen with their bodies only. The situation at the site was different from what Ambrose Lee and the police spokesperson said.

Hong Kong People’s Alliance on WTO said the protestors were pretty restrained today. The organizer didn’t agree to the burning of the shrine by South Korean demonstrators but they understood their feelings. Although some protestors jumped into the sea, the organizers regarded it as non-violent protest actions.

In today’s protest actions, three protestors entered hospital and two of them had left already. The police said two policemen were injured but they had left hospital already.

reflex relay

Additions

For pictures of today's protests

13.12.2005 21:54

Pics of today's protest are available at

 http://www.indymedia.ie/newswire.php?story_id=73444

Check this link


Upcoming Coverage
View and post events
Upcoming Events UK
24th October, London: 2015 London Anarchist Bookfair
2nd - 8th November: Wrexham, Wales, UK & Everywhere: Week of Action Against the North Wales Prison & the Prison Industrial Complex. Cymraeg: Wythnos o Weithredu yn Erbyn Carchar Gogledd Cymru

Ongoing UK
Every Tuesday 6pm-8pm, Yorkshire: Demo/vigil at NSA/NRO Menwith Hill US Spy Base More info: CAAB.

Every Tuesday, UK & worldwide: Counter Terror Tuesdays. Call the US Embassy nearest to you to protest Obama's Terror Tuesdays. More info here

Every day, London: Vigil for Julian Assange outside Ecuadorian Embassy

Parliament Sq Protest: see topic page
Ongoing Global
Rossport, Ireland: see topic page
Israel-Palestine: Israel Indymedia | Palestine Indymedia
Oaxaca: Chiapas Indymedia
Regions
All Regions
Birmingham
Cambridge
Liverpool
London
Oxford
Sheffield
South Coast
Wales
World
Other Local IMCs
Bristol/South West
Nottingham
Scotland
Social Media
You can follow @ukindymedia on indy.im and Twitter. We are working on a Twitter policy. We do not use Facebook, and advise you not to either.
Support Us
We need help paying the bills for hosting this site, please consider supporting us financially.
Other Media Projects
Schnews
Dissident Island Radio
Corporate Watch
Media Lens
VisionOnTV
Earth First! Action Update
Earth First! Action Reports
Topics
All Topics
Afghanistan
Analysis
Animal Liberation
Anti-Nuclear
Anti-militarism
Anti-racism
Bio-technology
Climate Chaos
Culture
Ecology
Education
Energy Crisis
Fracking
Free Spaces
Gender
Globalisation
Health
History
Indymedia
Iraq
Migration
Ocean Defence
Other Press
Palestine
Policing
Public sector cuts
Repression
Social Struggles
Technology
Terror War
Workers' Movements
Zapatista
Major Reports
NATO 2014
G8 2013
Workfare
2011 Census Resistance
Occupy Everywhere
August Riots
Dale Farm
J30 Strike
Flotilla to Gaza
Mayday 2010
Tar Sands
G20 London Summit
University Occupations for Gaza
Guantanamo
Indymedia Server Seizure
COP15 Climate Summit 2009
Carmel Agrexco
G8 Japan 2008
SHAC
Stop Sequani
Stop RWB
Climate Camp 2008
Oaxaca Uprising
Rossport Solidarity
Smash EDO
SOCPA
Past Major Reports
Encrypted Page
You are viewing this page using an encrypted connection. If you bookmark this page or send its address in an email you might want to use the un-encrypted address of this page.
If you recieved a warning about an untrusted root certificate please install the CAcert root certificate, for more information see the security page.

Global IMC Network


www.indymedia.org

Projects
print
radio
satellite tv
video

Africa

Europe
antwerpen
armenia
athens
austria
barcelona
belarus
belgium
belgrade
brussels
bulgaria
calabria
croatia
cyprus
emilia-romagna
estrecho / madiaq
galiza
germany
grenoble
hungary
ireland
istanbul
italy
la plana
liege
liguria
lille
linksunten
lombardia
madrid
malta
marseille
nantes
napoli
netherlands
northern england
nottingham imc
paris/île-de-france
patras
piemonte
poland
portugal
roma
romania
russia
sardegna
scotland
sverige
switzerland
torun
toscana
ukraine
united kingdom
valencia

Latin America
argentina
bolivia
chiapas
chile
chile sur
cmi brasil
cmi sucre
colombia
ecuador
mexico
peru
puerto rico
qollasuyu
rosario
santiago
tijuana
uruguay
valparaiso
venezuela

Oceania
aotearoa
brisbane
burma
darwin
jakarta
manila
melbourne
perth
qc
sydney

South Asia
india


United States
arizona
arkansas
asheville
atlanta
Austin
binghamton
boston
buffalo
chicago
cleveland
colorado
columbus
dc
hawaii
houston
hudson mohawk
kansas city
la
madison
maine
miami
michigan
milwaukee
minneapolis/st. paul
new hampshire
new jersey
new mexico
new orleans
north carolina
north texas
nyc
oklahoma
philadelphia
pittsburgh
portland
richmond
rochester
rogue valley
saint louis
san diego
san francisco
san francisco bay area
santa barbara
santa cruz, ca
sarasota
seattle
tampa bay
united states
urbana-champaign
vermont
western mass
worcester

West Asia
Armenia
Beirut
Israel
Palestine

Topics
biotech

Process
fbi/legal updates
mailing lists
process & imc docs
tech