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Rage Against The War - 300,000 take to the streets in Italy (english)
by Kleid/McSnipe 5:06am Mon Oct 15 '01 (Modified on 8:13am Mon Oct 15 '01)
 mcsnipekleid@hotmail.com

On the day before Berlusconi meets Bush to promise Italian
support for the war in Afghanistan the Italian people show how they feel by marching 24 kilometres from the city of Perugia to Assissi, 300.000
strong, in the name of peace.

Download attached file: pg-as7. (mimetype: image/x-pict )The Perugia-Assissi peace march has been a national instituton since 1961 when it was the preserve of concerned catholics and scouts. Recent years have seen a more broad based march including anarchists and communists demonstrating against war and state terrorism. Since the
events of Genoa at the G8 summit this year, before the twin tower attacks and the American retaliations, the Genoa Social Forum, the Tutte Bianche and the Social Centres had announced that they would be taking part in the march. With the advent of war, these groups became even more
determined to participate to express their rejection of terrorism and of war. In the event, the scouts and catholics were vastly outnumbered by ordinary people taking to the streets to condemn the American response to the terrorist attacks at least as much as the terrorist
attacks themselves. There were hundreds of thousands more protesters than anyone had expected and the projected route of the 24 kilometre (!) that‚s more than 10 miles) march overflowed into surrounding fields and roads, taking over one whole side of a motorway for about 3 miles.
The DS (Mainstream left wing party) leader who had voted in favour of the war in parliament had the nerve to join the march and even attempted to address the marchers as they reached their destination, but his speech was drowned in a multitude of whistles and jeers. We were a small group marching under an anarchist flag, and there were
at least three small anarchist blocks on the stretch of march where we were, and given that some reports suggested that the march was 11 kilometres long and we only saw about a kilometre of it it‚s safe to say that we were well represented. Several elderly people commented positively on the presence of our flag - one middle aged woman from the
„Women in Black‰ kissed the corner of it and told us to carry it with pride, while an elderly man asked us what it meant, then said „that‚s what I thought - I am glad to see you here, without anarchy there is no culture‰.
On arrival at our destination the march was greeted with banners denouncing the DS leaders who had hypocritically joined the march after voting for the war („the enemy is at your head‰), another huge „Rage Against The War‰ banner, and a „There‚s only one ŒBlack Block‚ - the Berlusconi Govenment‰ banner - a reference to the more inexplicable
block activities in Genoa, generally accepted among activists in Italy to have been the work of agents-provocateur and fascists mixed in with
some easily-led anarchist kids. The best chant had to be one which roughly translates as: „People of Afghanistan - let‚s make an exchange:you hand over Bin Laden, and we‚ll hand over Berlusconi‰ only in Italian it rhymes and is funnier. If you haven‚t heard about this march in America in the American media then think for a minute what that says about demonstrating: there were at least as many people on the Pergia-Assissi peace march as there were
at Genoa. They were arguably even more committed to their cause, being prepared to spend the whole day marching over 10 miles to express their outrage in a peaceful, reasoned way as the authorities (and the organisers of the march) had requested. Now consider how much press attention was given to the Genoa protests - weeks in the news, special
reports in Time and Newsweek and so on covering the issues the protestors were demonstrating about - compared to what you have heard about the Perugia Assissi Peace march, where everybody thought they would do as they were told - „it will be far more effective if it is peaceful‰. Here in Italy, the march merely warranted a mention on the
national television news (films of smiling scouts with „forza placards and a mention of the DS leader being whistled off the platform) while the newspapers did give it at least a mention on the front pages .
Granted, in the current climate of villages being destroyed and anthrax paranoia I would expect the march to be less widely reported than normal- but it appears that the black blocs can take solace in their argument that to get a demonstration noticed, violence against property and
street fighting with the police are the only way forward. As a pacifist, it pains me to admit it, but the black blocs have a good point.
add your own comments



???info??? (english)
by chris 6:57am Mon Oct 15 '01



Searching the web returned no documents for either "Perugia-Assissi peace march" or just "Perugia-Assissi". There is no information on this event anywhere.

chris


it happened (english)
by Julia 8:13am Mon Oct 15 '01



I saw some shots of it yesterday on corporate media I think it was on the BBC. You can try sourcing articles and their site I think the address is www.bbc.co.uk

Also have a look at indymedia Italy I'm sure there would be some photos and the like on there.