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.

Police opression and intimidation in Manchester

Thomas J | 22.03.2003 21:22 | Anti-militarism | Repression

After the Manchester rally, the police penned in about 30 protesters in Bridgewater Street. They also intimidated and used heavy handed tactics against thoses trying to support them.

The anti-war march in Manchester was realtively peaceful, and so was the rally in Castlefield, until the police, unprovoked, tried to seal us in. About 30 protesters, many of them (but not all) Muslims, were held at a corner in Bridgewater Street at 4pm, much to the dismay of many protesters. The police said they would be released if they the remainder of the crowd were to disperse, but we stood our ground as we realised they could easlily arrest them if we were to leave. The police tried to pesuade us to move to the pavement, and tried to surround even more of us when reinforcements came. They then resorted to heavy-handed tactics, and shoved us. At least one officer was not wearing his number, and I witnessed him, and another officer, deliberatly shove us. Later, I felt a officers hand grab me roughly, and I was told 'Aren't you intellegent? There's the pavement.' They threatend even more of us with arrest if we didn't leave the area, even those who were on the pavement. The confrontation finally stopped 10 minutes later, with the protestors relesed, but however, I obseved people in police vans, and later heard that they had definately been arrests made. Our group made our way to the police station in Gower Street, and I attempted to make a complaint about our treatment by the police. We were told that there we had to see an Inspector, and the nearest station with an Inspector was 3 miles away! We also learnt they the people arrested were being held until the protested had completely died down in the area, and we exchanged contact details with a member of a group which had members arrested.

The police oppression was caught on camera, if anyone has any evidence that can help the people who were arrested or otherwise ill-treated by the police, make it available to them, if you were on the Manchester protest and were arrested, or had any of your group arrested, post your contact details so people can contact you with any useful information. Sadly I cannot help anymore, as I am based over 40 miles away in the Stoke-on-Trent area, but if anyone can help these people, do so.

Thomas J

Comments

Hide the following 6 comments

police etc

23.03.2003 23:34

was a sweet demo. the police were definitely trying to provoke trouble as usual. the bbc was lying when it said no arrests were made, i saw arrests made.

love Jay

Jason Juliet


It was a peaceful demonstration

24.03.2003 00:35

I was at that demonstration and rally and videoed most of it. So I can prove this assertion. I am amazed (well actually I am not) that this incident took place after such a non-eventful, peaceful day of protest. There were no civil disobedience actions that day. Whole families were on that demonstration--men, women and children.

This was obviously a bit of pathetic macho-posturing by the police.

Meanwhile the real criminals, who are dropping bombs on a largely defenceless city the size of London--Baghdad--with 8 million citizens are being cheered on by the very people who control the Manchester police--the British Establishment.

For videos on the anti-war protests in Manchester, go to:

 http://tv.oneworld.net/tapestry?story=647

Chris Edwards
mail e-mail: drcce2002@yahoo.com


I was there as well

24.03.2003 15:10

Arrests were made on Liverpool Rd where there was a confrontation between some protesters and people in the pub on the corner. There were a group of hooligans drinking in that pub who taunted the demonstrators and shouted racial abuse at some of the muslims as they walked by. One of the muslim women threw I think a brick at the men.
Where were the police when they were needed? They were driving off in their vans when the trouble started. This sort of behaviour sends a message that the police don't care for protecting the demonstrators from drunken hooligans. In fact they had blocked off the road so that the demonstrators had to walk right past the pub! They only cared about stopping the demonstrators reaching the city centre. In other words, rather than doing their job protecting people they are being used as a political tool to repress any type of dissent.

richarit


Manchester demo 22/03/03

26.03.2003 20:14

I was in Deansgate at the end of the demo. I wittnessed the police heming in a group of mainly muslim women protestors. When I asked a senior officer why this was happening and she said that it was because 'we' had been giving her officers the 'runaround' for three days!! I can only assume that she was reffering to the the demos and blockades after the war had started.

I was in Liverpool road at the end. I wittnessed a brick being thrown by someone who was drinking at the White Lion pub as well as a lot of racist abuse directed at the black and asian people around me. A protestor was hit by the brick and recived a nasty head injury. I belive that something might of been thrown back at the pub by a young girl protestor. I phoned an ambalance but during the call a man suddenly started to attack the people I was standing with. At the time I thought that he was trying to attack the injured man. I helped to wrestle this man to the ground. The police then arrived and I left the area.

During this whole incident the Police sat back and watched. I had been in the pub ealier and I noticed that the drinkers were very anti the march and were muttering threats. I know that this is a pub where a lot of 'football fans' drink and I cannot belive that the Police did not know that there might be trouble between the drinkers and protestors. I belive that the Police allowed the sitution to happen.

I would be intested in any one elses views on this matter.
Andy

Andy
mail e-mail: a.fairlie@btopenworld.com


Police hassle

26.03.2003 23:18

The march on Saturday was indeed peaceful, and one has to say broadly supported by the majority of passers by, shoppers, etc. The exception though was on Liverpool road. Two heavily built men joined the march on the pavement from John Dalton St. to abuse the marchers, telling us to support our boys, get a job, the usual stuff. They actually stopped outside outside the White Hart pub to hurl racist abuse, etc at the marchers, and up until the point that two policewomen told them to shut it and move on, I had thought that they were police agent provocateurs trying to wind us up and cause a fracas!

Whatever, don't let the fascists grind us down. Our cause is just.

EricB


Assistance

31.03.2003 13:03


Did'nt know this had happened on this demo. Can peaople send written reports of what happened (with as much detail as possible) to the CASWI/CND office in Manchester.

An official complaint by the organisors of this march is going in but if anybody has video or photograph footage can you please get this to the office aswell.

Also does anyone know whats happened to the arrested people.

please let us know at the address.

cheers,
Jake

Jake


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