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1999 WTO Protest

News from the Seattle

Articles on this Page
News on Seattle Hearings- Dec/99
Chemical Weapons used in Seattle
Rodney King discovered America - from Milutin <noshelter@tao.ca> Tue, 7 Dec/99
Seattle Police and vegans - From: Good Goals <vrc@tiac.net>Wed, 08 Dec 1999
American Civil Liberties Union collects reports on Seattle police violence
Alert! Pike Place Market Gassing
organise wto prisoner solidarity action - From: Stephanie Sersli,  4 Dec 99
WTO protesters tortured in Seattle jails (fwd Anitra Freeman) Sun, 5 Dec 1999
tortured by police in Seattle - From: berlin@socrates.berke
Interview with Seattle MD-- Richard DeAndrea Dec 6/99
Dr. Interviewed in the NYTimes Forums
innocent bystander arrested at pike place market -by sharon borgstrom, 4 Dec 99
Diary of Seattle-WTO photographer From: Yuill Sun, 05 Dec 1999
The World Trade Organization should be charged with War Crimes
Capsules of Seattle Brutality - clipped from the Toronto Media
WTO Arrests of Canadians- Jailing Unwarranted Dec 3/99
Rage Against Corporate America- by Chad McCulley, Dec 3/99
Hell In Seattle- from yura Dec/99
No globalization without representation - from Free Student Press Project
Collateral Damage in Seattle
& Report from Portland student Jim Desyllas -from Janet M Eaton Dec 2/99
What I said to the mayor of Seattle -  by Chrysalis Farm, Dec 2/99
Seattle Occupation - by Gordon McGlothlen, Dec2/99
I'm Still Ablaze-by Gabriel Taylor, Dec 2/99
What YOU can do to preserve LIBERTY -  by Chrysalis Farm, Dec 2/99
CUPW in Seattle, Dec 1, 1999
POSTAL WORKERS FORM HUMAN BARRICADE IN SEATTLE
CROSS CANADA CARAVAN CONVERTED TO SEATTLE FIRST AID STATION
PROVACATEURS/POLICE OUT OF HAND
Eyewitness account of nonviolent action at WTO -  by Peter Bergel, Dec/99
Seattle demo: a view from the street - by Brian Williams, Dec 1/99
yet another account of the wto protest- by Jonathan Oppenheim, Dec/99
Police Attack Brutally and Quickly-  by Morgan Stewart
Stop the WTO, my story  - by Erin Smith, Dec/99
The WTO was SHUT DOWN in seattle!- by Yang Chang, Nov/99
Seattle Report with Photos - by Tony Formo, Dec/99
Photos and Diary at  http://www.monkeybagel.com/

Photos below are copies of photos sent by Tony Formo as the protest action began
tonyformo@jps.net

View WTO1.jpg

View WTO2.jpg

View WTO3.jpg

  other photos

View wto4.jpg

View wto5.jpg

Links to other web media coverage.

E-mail a brief letter to all Canadian politicians asking them to withdraw and cancel our membership with the WTO.

Facts World Trade Organization
WTO  Sets rules for the global economy and enforces them
US delegations to the Uruguay Round; the vast majority were members of the corporate elite
GATS: Extends rules to include services: health care, education, water systems...
Key players - U.S. Coalition of Service Industries
TRIPS: Patents life forms, DNA, traditional medicines, etc.
Key Players - Intellectual Property Committee (Monsanto, Dupont, GM, Bristol Myers, Squibb, & 7 other major US corporations)
Financial Services: Gives "North" banks open access to entire world
Key Players - Financial Leaders Group (Barclays Bank, Chase Manhattan, Ford Financial Services, Bank of Tokyo, Goldman Sachs, Royal Bank of Canada, etc.)
Millennium Round
Lets corporations overturn national laws
Key Players - International Chamber of Commerce & the Investment Network (Fiat, Daimler-Chrysler, BP, etc.), and the U.S. Coalition of Service Industries
WTO Agreements
Agriculture: The Uruguay Round Agreement expands markets for global food corporations like Cargill and Archer Daniels Midland, while undercutting small farmers and food self-sufficiency.
Food Safety: The WTO's Sanitary and Phytosanitary Standards (SPS) tell countries "how much safety" they can have — and even whether they can label possible hazards. The SPS Agreement protects trade at the expense of scientific caution and consumer protection.
Services: 70% of the U.S. Gross National Product now comes from services like banking, telecommunications, and health care. GATS, the General Agreement on Trade and Services, opens up the world to highly developed U.S. service corporations.
Patents and Copyrights: TRIPS, the Trade-Related Intellectual Property Agreement, extends U.S. "first come first patent" rules to the whole world. Under TRIPS, a corporation can patent a strain of rice grown for hundreds of years in India, a medicinal plant from the Amazon jungles, or even your DNA.
Investment: TRIMS, Trade-Related Investment Measures, give corporations more rights to use their money however they want without government interference.
Dispute Settlement: Under the WTO, trade complaints go to a secret, unelected panel of three "trade experts." Their decision is binding on all the countries in the WTO.
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Related CitizensontheWeb pages

Tax the Corpocracy -Reclaim the Wealth

CitizensontheWeb.com - Economic Reform Page

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All out Chemical Warfare was used on  protesters at World Trade Org demo in Seattle.

Before police and military personnel got out of control in Seattle a tense meeting took place among federal, state and city officials in a command center at Seattle police headquarters. The decisions made in that meeting led to the creation of a "no protest" zone and downtown curfew, and the decision to use chemical weapons and extreme violence to create such a zone. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and Attorney General Janet Reno were active in pressuring Seattle officials to crack down on the protests.
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CNN confirmed the presence of active US military chemical warfare specialists in Seattle for the WTO meeting. They were there as "anti-terrorism" advisors.

Weapons used by police in Seattle on protesters include rubber bullets, tear gas grenades,hand-held pepper-spray canisters, flash-bang grenades, an armored personnel carrier, and an attack helicopter are all part of the department's crowd-control arsenal. Paint balls filled with pepper spray were fired from a high speed hopper gun to torture and mark protestors.

Police dressed all in black used nightsticks the size of baseball bats shot plastic bullets, pepper spray. They fired heavy canisters of gas over protestors' heads. One flying grenade struck a woman between the eyes.

Forces included the Seattle Police Department N, the King County Sheriff, the U.S. Secret Service, the Port of Seattle Police, the Federal Protective Service, and at least one other agency that police spokesman refused to identify.

The tear gases used were OC, widely known as pepper spray, and deadly CS. Police fired tear gas and pepper spray indiscriminately without provocation or warning.

Flash-bang grenades were fired high in the air where to explode with a brilliant light and a very loud explosion.

Helicopters with a spotlight moved in on protestors and on Capitol Hill, police used a brilliant spotlight while simultaneously firing tear gas grenades over the heads of protesters.

An armored personnel carrier was used as a platform from which to launch tear-gas, flash-bang, and rubber bullet attacks.

Evidence of Nerve Gas
KIRK JAMES MURPHY, MD: Individuals exposed to chemical weapons in the late afternoon and evening of December 1st at two locations downtown blocks adjacent to Pike Place Market and the Seattle neighborhood of Capitol Hill evinced and reported a pattern of symptoms which is inconsistent with the pattern of symptoms which may be ascribed to irritating agents. This "atypical" pattern of symptoms includes the rapid onset of: mydriasis (pupillary dilation) with resultant impairment of visual acuity; tachycardia (rapid heart rate) with some palpitations; new-onset hypertension (high blood pressure) in one individual; nausea, vomiting, diarrhea (persisting for days after exposure); abrupt or immediate onset of menstruation (asynchronous with usual menstrual cycle); muscular fasciculation (twitches); muscular dyscoordination; lethargy, confusion, disorientation, diminished concentration, nocturnal hallucinations. Moreover, some casualties reported an abrupt experience of loss of muscular tone and strength that sometimes (but not always) immediately preceded a loss of consciousness; one observer of these affected individuals reported uncontrolled, spasmodic movements in those affected.

Some individuals exposed in the Pike Place Market area reported that the aforementioned symptoms came immediately after exposure to a non-irritating agent which was did not cause pain, lacrimation, or burning on mucous membranes.

. . . The pattern of symptoms is not consistent with known mechanisms of action of the irritant chemical weapons OC, CS, or CN. The pattern, however, is consistent with disruption of neurotransmitter activity. Lamentably, the single most compelling explanation for the observed findings is the (deliberate or accidental) inclusion of "incapacitating agents" which disrupt neuronal function in the chemical munitions discharged by law enforcement agencies in Seattle during the WTO protest.

While direct cholinergic effects or indirect (inhibition of acetylcholinesterase) effects arising from synergistic combinations (of OC, CS, and CN) cannot be ruled out at this time, the experience and observations Medical Collective members, together with the aforementioned information, appears to most robustly support the hypothesis that the casualties described above resulted from exposure to cholinesterase inhibitors used as chemical weapons in crowd control.

The Seattle Post-Intelligencer reported on December 4 that the Seattle Police Department had to replenish its chemical weapons stocks by going to outside sources. Various individuals have reported being told by individual law enforcement officers that chemical weapons in addition to OC, CS, and CN were deployed by various entities; these anecdotal accounts are not yet confirmed.

Any information regarding the use of chemical munitions in addition to OC, CS or CN, as well as information regarding the discharge of chemical weapons by agencies other than the Seattle Police Department would be helpful.

. . . If you were exposed to chemical weapons during the WTO protests and have the pattern of "atypical" symptoms discussed below, please make a written, signed, and dated account of your exposure, including details such as the (approximate) location in which you were exposed and the date and part of the day (morning, midday, afternoon, evening) of your exposure, as well as the nature of your symptoms. Please send such accounts to the email above and to the ACLU unit investigating law enforcement actions in Seattle during the WTO protests.

KIRK JAMES MURPHY, MD: mailto:kmurphy@ucla.edu
===========

Questions on force and chemical weapons - Dec/99
   A small number of Special Forces  troops, were sent to Seattle by the Defense Department for the meeting of  the World Trade Organization. The military mission, according to the Pentagon, was to provide support to  the FBI, Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), U.S. Secret Service  and  other government agencies responsible for security there.

   Four special forces troops from the Joint Special Operations Task Force were deployed to Seattle to be on hand to advise FBI "crisis support" agents. Fifty-five military Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) teams, along with 25 explosive-detecting dogs and their handlers, were sent. The soldiers wore civilian attire -- keeping a low presence, Defense Department documents say. Troops from the U.S. Army Biological-Chemical Command and many other US military outfits were there. Six members of the Wyoming Air National Guard lent a hand by flying 3,300 pounds of civilian riot control munitions from Casper, Wyo., to Seattle.

   This leads many people to wonder exactly who really was in command of all police and military personnel once the city went into a state of "Civil Emergency"? It also raises the very serious question as to why police were allowed to roam the streets with authority to use deadly force if necessary without proper identification? Were some of these unidentifiable police in actuality military personnel and is this the reason they refused to give proper identification when asked? In light of allegations of various "strange symptoms" not normally associated with the effects of tear gas on people and the possible harm to the environment, a disclosure of the exact contents of the 3,300 pounds of civilian control munitions from Casper, Wyo., to Seattle is indeed in order. Were neurotoxins part of this dispatch (or any dispatch) of "civilian control munitions"?
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Some Facts on the Policing and Chemical Weapons Use
* Seattle cops worked closely with Feds who in turn were advised by active US military including Special Forces
* Federal agents spread rumors among local police: "Expect five to six officers deaths"
* Panicked Seattle cops armed themselves with gas including some provided by Federal agents in Wyoming
---------
"We had some follow-up meetings and an officer whose brother works for King County said there was FBI and Secret Service in their riot training sessions and they were told to fully anticipate that five to six officers would be lost during the protests, either seriously injured or killed."
- Brett Smith, 10 year veteran of the Seattle Police
Posted to alt.law-enforcement from article in SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER

Also from P-I:
"A handful of officers took matters into their own hands, getting permission to empty the munitions stores of police departments in Auburn, Renton and Tukwila, the King County Jail and the Department of Corrections. In addition, some drove around in a sport-utility vehicle to buy chemical agents from a local law enforcement supply business.
Meanwhile, a police captain flew to Casper, Wyo., to pick up a stock of gas from federal agents."

* Local chief says he does not know how his loaned officers were trained
Source: http://www.seattle-pi.com/local/cops09.shtml
"The image is shocking: A SWAT officer on riot duty last week during the World Trade Organization protests kicks an unarmed man in the groin.
Then he fires a beanbag round from his rifle at close range while the man retreats, hands high above his head. Today, the Tukwila police officer returns to desk duty after a week's suspension from the Valley Emergency Services Unit as his supervisors look into the Dec. 1 incident."
"We need to understand what the circumstances were; what they were instructed to do," the chief said.
Brass Check - http://www.brasscheck.com
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News on Seattle Hearings- Dec/99

   The police chief has resigned. One police officer has been suspended for assaulting a civilian. The city is facing a lawsuit filed against another officer who allegedly pepper sprayed two women while they were in a car.

   City council's investigation has already drawn hundreds of citizens with tales of victimization. At the hearings, dozens of residents described being sprayed with tear gas and pepper spray while walking home from work or shopping. One woman with asthma said she continues to have trouble breathing a week after inhaling the tear gas. Others told how officers threw tear gas canisters into the doorways of restaurants and businesses, trapping customers inside and causing fumes to seep in.

   Ken Schulman saw officers start launching tear gas canisters without warning — and with no demonstrators in sight, only innocent residents.

   Barbara Liberace, 60, was walking to her downtown doctor's office for her chemotherapy treatment. An officer yelled at her, "Bitch, when I tell you to move, you will move," and then hit her with a baton, breaking her wrist.

   Jennifer Whitney, the medical team coordinator for the Direct Action Network, said she’s receiving 40 calls a day from people who are still suffering from the tear gas. 4,000 people who were injured by tear gas, pepper spray, rubber bullets and assaults from police officers. Hundreds of people were hit in the face and head with rubber bullets, including one young woman who, after being shot in the head, got pepper sprayed in her face and then was hit by a baton. One officer used his baton to hit a wheelchair-bound man with multiple sclerosis. Officers sprayed pepper spray in the faces of medics while they were treating injured protesters. At other times they confiscated medics’ supplies.

   The American Civil Liberties Union of Washington, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International have called for the city to appoint an independent review panel to do its own investigation free of political influence.
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WTO Seattle Aftermath - Dec 6/99 -
Report Incidents of Police Misconduct to the American Civil Liberties Union
   The American Civil Liberties Union of Washington is closely monitoring police treatment of WTO protesters and residents of Seattle. They are looking for incidents of police action against citizens that have occurred during the WTO conference.
   They need personal reports of any of the following activities - if they happened to you or if you were a witness:
   Unprovoked physical aggression by police: shoving, kicking, hitting with billyclubs, overly forceful restraint
   Use of pepper spray, tear gas, CS gas, shots of rubber bullets against non-violent protesters or onlookers either without warning or in excess
   Being pursued or chased by police when trying to flee or disperse
   Encountering any of these activities as a bystander or within an area that is NOT a designated "no-protest zone"
   Or other unreasonable restrictions on your civil liberties
   We need details on what happened to you or what you witnessed. Please contact the ACLU of Washington right away!
   If you know someone who does not have web access, but would like to file a complaint, please have them call the ACLU Complaint and Referral Line
206-624-2180
http://www.aclu.org/action/wtoform.html
Click here for ACLU-WA's ONLINE COMPLAINT FORM
http://www.aclu-wa.org/ISSUES/police/WTO%20ACLU.htm
 

Alert!Pike Place Market Gassing - Health Warning (fwd)  Mon, 6 Dec 1999  From:  David Barbarash <otter@vcn.bc.ca>
A NONLETHAL NERVE GAS MAY HAVE BEEN USED on Wednesday, December 1st @ Broadway Street and Pike Place Market
   Dr. Kirk Murphy of the DAN Medic Team has issued this warning, in the hopes of compiling documentation of chemical warfare. He urges anyone who  participated in the aforementioned demo who exhibits/ed the following symptoms to contact him ASAP:
- abrupt onset of menstruation
- vomiting/diarrhea
- temporary impairment of vision
- confusion
- brief unconsciousness
- convulsions
- delayed burning
Dr. Kirk Murphy - 206-396-3983
Please pass this message on to anyone who attended the march on the afternoon of December 1st.
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The World Trade Organization should be charged with War Crimes
December 3rd 1999

(This is an opinion for the Coalition for a Federal Ban on Pepper Spray & the Use of Chemical Weapons on Canadian Citizens.)

   Pepper Spray and other gas weapons used in Seattle by security forces of the WTO are banned chemical weapons under the Geneva Convention. Reports from Seattle this week document cases of abuse too numerous to list in this letter. A woman with asthma nearly died when sprayed. A man fled down city streets with a baby for some distance before police got to him and unleashed the spray. The spray was used as a tool in arbitrary arrests where police just moved in, incapacitated people with the spray and then herded them off to mass detention.

   In Canada evidence at the APEC inquiry is to the effect that the RCMP moved in to attack protesters with pepper spray because orders came from higher up. These were orders to clear roads immediately by any means possible. In Seattle some residents are blaming the mayor and calling for his resignation. But the truth may be that the mayor is just becoming a scapegoat for the WTO. What likely happened is orders came directly from WTO security chiefs for those areas to be cleared. In the USA the police have been growing more violent and abusive in recent years and it appears the WTO took advantage of this and harnessed that force to the maximum.

   Since the WTO is a world body, and the people attacked were residents of many nations, the use of pepper spray amounts to a war crime and a violation of the Geneva Convention. The WTO should also be investigated as to the arbitrary arrests and detention of hundreds of people. And let's not forget that many of those hit by the gas weapons were in fact being openly tortured and denied treatment.

   Nearly all of the protesters and residents present in Seattle were there to exercise their right to free speech. Most believe that Trade is a natural endeavor of nations, but that Free Trade is an ideological thing. In this case protest is one of the only avenues that can be taken. Ideologues, as history shows, do not want citizens to participate in their own democracy. Any influx of genuine ideas and debate would spoil the grand utopian dream. Free Trade might become Fair Trade or Mixed Trade.

   The truth is that the sacred cow of Free Trade is diseased and if it dies nations will still trade as in the past. The real sacred cow we have to protect is the rights of citizens to free speech and to participate in their own government.

   Some things are too important to lose and that is why the WTO should face charges for the crimes it has committed in Seattle.

By Gary Morton

The anti pepper spray coalition web site is at
pepper.htm
A letter on the recent pepper attack on housing advocates in Ottawa is at
pepper.htm#let
---------
WTO Editorial by Gary Morton
December 1999 - Appalling Ciivil Right Violations in Support of the  WTO in Seattle - Nov/99

    We have reports from Canadians and Americans protesting the latest attempt by the World Trade Organization to short circuit democracy and the rights of world citizens.
   Read their views from the streets by scrolling this page for a number of articles and links to other sites and coverage.
   Using chemical warfare and violence against peaceful protesters, citizens and reporters, National Guard and police have arrested and jailed 600 or more people in Seattle. They have been bussed to a police concentration camp set up at a mothballed navy base in suburban Seattle.
   Though non-violent protesters have been tear-gassed and pepper-sprayed reports indicate the police simply left the few people responsible for the acts of vandalism on the streets for corporate media to film.
   Police have created a 46-block "no protest" zone to keep activists away from the World Trade Organization. Yet the curfew has no basis in law. People are are appalled that their constitutional rights to free speech and free assembly have been suspended to create a militarized zone for the WTO.
   A spokesman for the United Steelworkers of America condemned police brutality saying, "I've witnessed things in the last four days that I didn't believe could happen in America." And in spite of the no protest zone police have even gone as far as a mile outside of it to attack local residents and protesters with tear gas, flash bombs and pepper spray. Police rush in without provocation and make no announcements before attacking.

The WTO Big Lie
    Basically the lie the WTO is pushing in this session is that it has a human face and that it is democratic. Bill Clinton's announcement on some minimum standards on child labour (standards that will never be enforced) are geared to create the human face. Yet at the same time WTO head Michael Moore and UN Secretary General Koffi Annan are saying that the WTO is not a world government and thus can't really ever have a face that is more than trade without a human rights aspect. China and its hordes of slaves are also entering the WTO in this session. So what does that say about the WTO and slave and child labour?

   On the democracy issue, the WTO insults the people of the world to talk about democracy while holding 600 protesters arbitrarily in a military concentration camp they quickly threw together in Seattle.
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Seattle Police and vegans
Wed, 08 Dec 1999
From: Good Goals <vrc@tiac.net>
Found this in one Seattle demonstrator's report:

   Now its about 11:00 pm and my group arrives to the jail...
They put us for four hours in a closed concrete cell,
before letting us to our cells to sleep. I later heard
that when One of us refused to move until he got to
see a lawyer, so the jailmen in response HIT HIM,
CHAINED HIM TO A CHAIR, PEPPER SPRAYED HIS FACE, AND
COVERED IT WITH CLOTH SO HE WOULDN'T BE ABLE TO ESCAPE
IT. They gave us food based on meat, ignoring the
demands of the vegan people..
--------

Dr. Interviewed in the NYTimes Forums

These are excerpts from an interview with Dr. Deandrea. He had come from Los Angeles to Seattle to participate in the protest and ended up taking care of the injured:

. . . . But I did see penetration wounds, I did see people bleeding. I did see teeth loss, I did see broken bones. There were children present, there were families present, they were firing upon families, mothers, grandmothers,. They were just firing at them. They came out in full police force. It was very obvious that there was an institutional control that had no regard of human rights whatever... They were shooting tear gas canisters directly at protesters' faces. [Regarding the plastic, bullets, here is] some of the damage I saw: these plastic bullets took off part of one person's jaw, smashed teeth in other people's mouths. We're treating people in a studio loft downtown. I just treated an ear wound. People have been treated for concussion injuries. There have been people who have been treated for plastic bullet wounds. Lots of tear gas injuries, lots of damage to cornea, lots of damage to the eyes and skins. They were using a pepper spray, a tear gas and they were also using some sort of nerve gas. We had reports of many demonstrators winding up with seizures the next day. It causes muscles to clamp up, muscle contraction, seizures. They have done several illegal things regarding these people in jail. They have been telling them that they would not be let out, not have their bail set if they didn't give their names. [Note: protesters have refused to give their names on the grounds that they do not have to speak unless they have a lawyer present.] It's their legal right not to give their name. They don't have to speak at all. Attorneys came up and said we are representing these people; the police called [them] ...liars. At this point they have still refused to let any of ...[the attorneys] see their clients.
 . . . . . .

Rodney King discovered America
Milutin <noshelter@tao.ca>
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 1999

"i just got back to Arizona today from Seattle and most of the media always
seems to talk about the violent protesters....in my opinion the protesters
were not violent, but the police were and more people should start talking
about violent police and police brutality instead of writing about violent
protesters. I was tear gassed many, many times, i was attacked by pepper
spray and concussion grenades, people next to me got hit by horses, beaten
with club's, and hit by rubber bullets. After i was arrested for sitting
down in a park on wednesday morning (spent three days in jail, without
talking to a judge or lawyer), i was pepper sprayed in the directly in the
eyes, beaten and kicked, thrown on the floor, all for going limp,...rodney
king (not columbus) discovered america." -- Geert Dhondt

Interview with Seattle MD:
From: NLP Wessex [mailto:nlpwessex@bigfoot.com]
Sent: Sunday, December 05, 1999 1:59 PM

"This is the beginning of a police state"

(posted on http://www.emperors-clothes.com at 1 am 12-4-99. Graphic pictures relating to this events described in this interview also available at http://www.emperors-clothes.com/).
Photos
http://www.emperors-clothes.com/bullets.jpg
http://www.emperors-clothes.com/bloodeye.jpg
--------

My name is Richard DeAndrea. I'm a medical doctor. What I saw up here was martial law. This turned into a police state. Everything you have seen on television regarding local news broadcasts including national public radio was a blackout. The police were using concussion grenades. They were shooting tear gas canisters directly at protesters' faces. They were using so-called rubber bullets. These are actually hard plastic. Some of the damage I saw: these plastic bullets took off part of one person's jaw, smashed teeth in other people's mouths. I saw the police arrest people who had their hands up in the air screaming we are peacefully protesting. The amount of looting that took place was so minimal I don't even know where they got the footage from. I am saying this beyond a shadow of a doubt. This is a definite sign that America is heading towards a police state unless people start standing up for their rights as individuals. I am actually shocked and ashamed. I am ashamed of the police force, I am ashamed of the mayor I am ashamed of Bill Clinton. I am ashamed of the whole thing.

Jared: These rubber bullets - what are they?

Dr. DeAndrea: They are made of polyester type material. They are like a hard plastic toy. The idea is to hit your body, do damage, not actually penetrate. But I did see penetration wounds, I did see people bleeding. I did see teeth loss, I did see broken bones. There were children present, there were families present, they were firing upon families, mothers, grandmothers,. They were just firing at them. They came out in full police force. They brought out swat teams, they had the national guard up here, there was CIA surrounding the delegates' buildings. It was very obvious that there was an institutional control that had no regard of human rights whatever.

In addition we have video footage of protesters being taken away as well as human rights being violated. Prisoners were taken and they were tortured. There is a case, I believe his name is Holm, Keith Holm. He was tortured because he would not give his name. They handcuffed, laid him on the floor, they smashed his face against the concrete, they grabbed his hair, they ripped out a lock of hair. and then placed pencils between his fingers and pressed on them until he would give his name. He refused. They were also banging his head against metal objects. He was actually the first protester released because the Internal Affairs came in to do an investigation and they wanted him gone because he would be able to give testimony.

We're treating people in a studio loft downtown. I just treated an ear wound. People have been treated for concussion injuries. There have been people who have been treated for plastic bullet wounds. Lots of tear gas injuries, lots of damage to cornea, lots of damage to the eyes and skins. They were using a pepper spray, a tear gas and they were also using some sort of nerve gas. We had reports of many demonstrators winding up with seizures the next day. It causes muscles to clamp up, muscle contraction, seizures.

They have done several illegal things regarding these people in jail. They have been telling them that they would not be let out, not have their bail set if they didn't give their names. Its their legal right not to give their name. They don't have to speak at all. Attorneys came up and said we are representing these people. The police called the attorneys liars. At this point they have still refused to let any of them see their clients. There are close to 600 people who were arrested and they have been holding them for two days on charges that are mostly misdemeanors, such as refusal to disperse. A lot of people in there have not gotten medical attention either. I have gotten calls from young ladies in there who have had all sorts of emotional problems as well as physical problems. They have called me for medical attention from inside the jail. There are people still sitting in there who have not even been processed.

Today there were fewer attacks by police, but they did arrest more people. And there was no violence today by the marchers and all through the day yesterday it was the same. What you are seeing on television about looting and anarchistic protesters - there's astraight-out blackout and they are basically pushing that [line]. There is not much damage to property here. There are not many windows that have been damaged or stores that have been looted. Those are extremely rare cases.

I used to believe newspapers were telling the truth. But now I am no longer behind that. This is the beginning of a police state. You can quote me on that.

--------
tortured by police in Seattle
From: <berlin@socrates.berkeley.edu>
Fwd: Wobbly tortured by police
(fwd) Date: Sat, 4 Dec 1999 17:57:45 -0800
(PST) Fellow Workers, I just caught up with a FW from Olympia today, Thursday, December 2nd. I did not get a chance to talk with her for very long, but she was visibly shaken. She is very concerned about her anonymity at this point. I will call her FW Marie.

FW Marie was one of the first people arrested here in Seattle. Her and her partner were arrested by themselves. Keeping with the tactic of non-compliance, they refused to surrender any information to the police. This tactic is used to block up the system and promote widespread solidarity within jail.

To break FW Marie down, the Seattle Police Department strapped her to a chair and beat her. They kicked her while lying prone on the floor. These officers isolated the two from each other and while alone in her cell, they threatened to strip her naked and periodically would unbuckle the harness she was wearing intimidating her with the threat of gang rape. She continued to refuse to give any information even as being peppersprayed. Another group of people was brought in and the FW Marie and her partner were integrated with this new group. This new group did not know anything about jail solidarity and gave the police all the information they asked for. When FW Marie and her partner began coaching the new arrestees on jail Solidarity, they were again thrown in isolation and beaten.

They were left in solitary for 18 hours. When the entire group was brought before the court, it was found that FW Marie and her partner were not registered in the jail. There were no records of their arrest nor any official documentation of their presence. Using this disappearing act, similar of Chile, Argentina and Brazil, the only people who knew of their presence, were the police officers conducting the torture. She and her partner were immediately released into the downtown region of Seattle, traumatized and in the middle of a riot. FW Marie made her way back to the Direct Action Network HQ and was safe as of 9 am Thursday. This account is to the best of my knowledge of what was directly related to me.

I am hoping that FW Marie will make her own statement when she feels able. One note for all FW's... I am writing much of this on the fly, since this situation is very fluid and I need to move fast and often. The Independent Media Center is not in any immediate danger, as a matter of fact, Ralph Nader is 10 feet away speaking out against WTO right now. The problem is editing. If you can edit length and grammar for redistribution to more media that would be great. We are hard pressed here and are constantly in the streets and on the phones. Ron Judd, Pres of the SCLC had his office call the IWW to request their presence at the big march tomorrow. Wish us luck, I hope someone is collecting video, I have got some great stuff shot by the IMC. Check out the stream video on indymedia.org for some great stuff. More later Eric in O... errr Seattle

WTO protesters tortured in Seattle jails (fwd)
Sun, 5 Dec 1999 13:59:10 -0800 (PST)
From: Anitra Freeman 

The Interfaith Vigil has already taken place, but the rest of this is still timely:

[forward]

Hi, Seattle Progressive Coalition ("SPC") members and allies,

Please come down to the King County Jail (5th & James) in Seattle today, Sunday, 12/5, at 1:00 for a Faith Healing Circle (see first posting below).

A number of non-violent protesters were released last night, including SPC member Amanda Jarman, Teamster 174 organizer Rob Hickey, and GLBT activist Paul Bristo... yet quite a number remain incarcerated as of late last night. Experiences of torture inflicted in the jail were recounted, for example:

- - A man with AIDS was denied his medication for 55 hours;

- - A woman was beaten so badly that her face was unrecognizable by her mug shot and had to be released;

- - Men with long hair (especially dred locks) were lifted off the ground by their hair;

- - Our prisoners were beaten on the back of their feet;and

- - Our prisoner' arms were twisted behind their backs and when up around the shoulder, guards intertwined and twisted their fingers, causing immense pain. In fact, two men passed out from this...

Late in the afternoon one of the National Lawyers Guild negotiators told me that they were on a verge of a deal to get everyone released... except City Attorney Mark Sidran killed the deal. We must oust that man!

SPC co-facilitator John Tirpak (bj047@scn.org), who is an attorney, advises people who feel they might need legal support around WTO issues to call the National Lawyers Guild legal team 206-621-5820, Direct Action Network legal team 206-632-9482, the Public Defenders 447-3900, and/or ACLU legal team 624-2180

To participate in helping gather statements of police abuse on Capitol Hill, contact UW law student Tara Herivel: therivel@u.washington.edu. Copies of citizen complaints about police behavior should be sent to:

- - ACLU: www.aclu-wa.org. Click on WTO;

--------

organise wto prisoner solidarity action- Sat, 4 Dec 99
From: Stephanie Sersli, steph_sersli@yahoo.com

Hi,

I've been helping out with the Direct Action Network Legal Team, who are providing legal support for those arrested during WTO protests in Seattle this week.

At this point there are something like 600 (we don't know exact numbers) people who have been arrested and are being held. I have been answering the phones today and have heard a number of disturbing reports from the prisoners:

1. women and men being held in solitary confinement because they refuse to identify themselves

2. men and women subjected to police torture (ie being pepper sprayed, beaten). One woman was beaten bloody this morning, another woman was stripped to her underwear, hogtied and dragged. Police were overheard threatening that they would use whatever force was necessary to get protesters to identify themselves.

3. no vegetarian meals provided unless the person provides two affidavits that they have been a vegetarian for at least one year

4. people being denied medication

5. people's eyeglasses being taken from them (some are legally blind) until they give their names

6. men being kneed in the groin if they use resistance tactics (ie going limp)

Yes, there are a fair number of Canadians who are being held by Seattle police, some of whom already have prior arrests (which means they can be identified a lot more readily).

Yes the police know we are using jail solidarity as a tactic and are trying to bust this up.

BUT there is AMAZING jail solidarity happening in those cells - very few people have given their names - and they need your support!! Activists in Seattle have been organising daily marches. Please organise in Vancouver and take part in a worldwide solidarity action.

Thanks,

Stephanie --------

innocent bystander arrested at pike place market
by sharon borgstrom
8:21pm Sat Dec 4 '99

this is my story as an innocent by-stander arrested at pike place and the 32 hours i spent incarcerated at a downtown precinct, sand point, and the king county jail.

i came over to seattle wed. afternoon hoping to gather some information on the wto. i wanted to talk to people about some of the issues and i really wanted to see the damage that had been done knowing that in a few days it would all be cleaned up and business would go on as usual. i had a great day walking around the city talking to people about all kinds of issues. i was hoping to find some protesters but none were to be found.

i walked up to capitol hill, i must say i was shocked at the troops of police officers blocking access to certain areas. i was really blown away when the police were marching in formation and cadence, it reminded me of the facism of nazi germany, this is not the seattle that that i know and love. I ended up on capital hill and still did not see any protesters, all seemed normal to me. I realized that I had better start heading back to the ferry landing because I wanted to get out of Seattle before it got dark. I ended up at the pike Place market where I finally found some peaceful protesters sitting at the entrance by the bronze pig. I listened to the songs they were singing and was impressed with their youth and passion.They were suddenly concerned about the safety of the merchants and the shoppers inside the market if the police decided to tear gas them and so they stood up and walked away. I walked towards the ferry. I got as far as the corner of Pike and 1st avenue. The police had lined up with their horses and their tear gas and their sound machine which duplicates the sound of what i imagine a nuclear explosion would sound like. They began throwing tear gas at these peaceful protesters that I had encountered earlier. They had linked arms and were singing.The sound effects the tear gas, the chaos, I was so confused I crossed the street into a forbidden zone I knew nothing about. I asked some officers what they thought they were doing and it was then that I was assaulted by four or five police officers with sticks pushing me towards a wall. My instincts took over. I was being attacked after all, for no reason.I pushed back. I was hit on the back of my head with a stick. I was handcuffed and taken one block to a squad car. I was yelling the whole way. I wanted to be known that I was an innocent bystander. I was not passive. I am not a trained protester. I had not planned to get arrested, I was on my way home.

I was taken to a police precinct somewhere in downtown Seattle and my wallet, car keys and ferry schedule were taken from my pockets. I was put into a holding cell for an hour. They then roughly put me into the back of a van. I was cuffed this whole time. This one one wild ride. I wasn't buckled up and since my hands were cuffed behind my back I was unable to steady myself. I was taken to Sandpoint. I was now wondering what I was being charged with, no one had read me any rights. The police officer at the downtown station asked me for a physical description of my arresting officer. I didn't know, they all look the same to me.

At Sandpoint I saw alot of insane things. A young woman who had a broken nose split lip recieving no medical attention. The police asked me all the usual questions. I was cooperative. Eventually I was put on a bus with some other women. After a while we were driven to the King county courthouse. We were processed and put into a holding tank with some others. There were telephones. At Sandpoint we were told that the phones were broken. People were calling their defense team. We were told that since marshall law had been declared we had no rights to an attorney.There were women that had been taken into custody at 7 o clock in the moning and it was now around mid-night. They had not eaten . We were not fed until 7 the next morning. Most of the women were denied food for 24 hours. There was a woman with us who was ill and denied medical attention.

What makes me really mad today is reading in the P.I. today, statements saying that we were not denied food and medical attention. Blatant lies. So many lies and I am so tired. I am sick of telling my story. I want my life back. I am a victim of violence and am suffering tonight from delayed stress. I am trying to stick to this story but I am getting really burnt out. There were so many incidents of abuse which I witnessed first hand inside the walls of King County Jail, at sandpoint, at that obscure police station where I was first held. I could go on and on. I was an innocent bystander....
----------

Diary of Seattle-WTO photographer
From: Yuill <seattle@worldvoices.org>
Sun, 05 Dec 1999

:: World Voices WTO Update 3 Personal Diary

:: Yuill Herbert and Jonathan Robinson in Seattle Wednesday 1 December 1999

Five in the morning. Wake up after a few hours sleep. No breakfast. Stumbled out into the pouring rain, forget jacket but there is no going back. Yuill remembers his.

Two days of engaging, talking and diplomacy fails. Civil disobedience becomes the gesture of those who have nowhere else to turn.

Thousands of activists have taken over the market for a briefing session. No mango and bread this morning.

Our march advances into rush hour traffic. Strange that there are no police. Protestors stop the traffic. Menacing four wheel drives often don't stop. Minutes later the Convention Centre is surrounded and trade delegates are blocked outside.

Anita Roddick is on the front line and feeds us nuts and raisons for breakfast. John Vidal from The Guardian is there too, complaining about timid US activists and that we don't have a lighter.

Two hours are spent sitting, linking arms. The riot police forming a double line in front of us. At one point a tank backs them up with tear gas and rubber bullets. They begin to move forward. We chant that this is a non-violent protest. Then we chant the world is watching. There are many TV cameras in between us and the police. Our hearts are pounding. The legal aid passes out the phone number to call when we are arrested. After some time the police back up. It is still raining, freezing cold too.

Lunchtime. A long thin alley that minutes earlier was blocked with riot police is now empty. Bewildered, hesitant, we explore. Twice we turned back, then changed our minds. No mistaking that we are entering the secured zone that hundreds of riot police are protecting with tanks. No point pretending, we are both petrified. Amateurish police blockades of large rubbish containers are easy to jump and we are in. It is exhilarating to realise we are behind the lines.

Few tenacious yet cautious steps are transformed by the sound of gun fire. Tear gas is pouring around the corner. We are on the run, so too are a handful of cameramen and journalists with credentials that legitimate their presence on the inside.

I mumble something as we stumble past John Vidal, he doesn't register. Yuill tries again, affectionately hitting him.

"Hey, what's happening?"

Tear gas speaks for itself. Crazy, but the three of us change direction straight into the almost romantic midst.

"Bastards… oh fuck, bastards, bastards".

John Vidal is not happy. You have to spit all the liquid out of your mouth as it is burning. The pain forces you to shut your eyes. Yuill is suffering too, choking badly and so am I. He stops, uncertain if he can go on. Pulling clothes over our faces we move on. We arrive at the place where the tear gas was released. The digital camera records the damage. Four police cars, wheels slashed, windows smashed and plastered with graffiti. Police reinforcements arrive, some hanging off a tank, all looking like Robocop.

Life on the inside ends abruptly. Riot police approach us requesting our passes. Of cause we have none.

Beyond the tense and dramatic front lines there are more protests. Eight people with their arms cemented together at the top of the hill. Already the police had tear-gassed them three times, surrounding the group and spraying their faces. Sometimes they even lifted the protester's gas masks off their faces to spray them more directly. But they held strong, cement meant they were going nowhere fast.

In other places the blockades were more peaceful, with banners, posters, costumes, huge puppets and drums. The people held their line, the police held theirs and WTO delegates did not pass.

Things suddenly turn rather insane. We are back at a blockade. The police move forward. The protesters sit down. The police fire pepper spray at the crouched people and step forward over them. We try and get pictures with the digital camera. The captured protesters link arms and legs. The police use their wooden sticks to separate the people, sometimes violently hitting them. Some people are thrown back over the line and some are carried away and arrested. We are shocked at the violence of the police.

Then loud bombs. The police are firing rubber bullets, tear gas and pepper spray into the crowd. Protesters with masks and paint on their skin grab the tear gas canisters as they land and toss them back into the ranks of the police. Then the protesters light a dumpster on fire. The air is filled with gas, fire and rubber bullets. We are on side, trying to take pictures of this. It is like a war zone. One person goes down under the rubber bullets in front of us. After a bit he crawls to safety. Jonathan, maybe unknowingly, is in the thick of it with the digital camera. I see Jonathan stuck between rioters and policemen and yell a warning. The police fire pepper spray which directly hits us. It is a pain beyond pain. We stagger through the crowd, leaning on each other, blinded and convulsing in pain. Medics with the Direct Action Network come to our rescue. We are drowned in water, the relief if incredible. The excruciating pain persists for maybe half an hour. Our faces are dabbed regularly with alcohol, then ointments. Finally the pain becomes bearable, we can see again and are on our way home. But things are getting worse. This is a depressing scene.

It is now three in the morning. Images from the digital camera have gone to hundreds of media and organisations around the world. Half asleep we talk live to radio stations abroad. We do our best to focus attention on the agenda of the World Trade Organisation, it is not easy. Meanwhile police helicopters circle overhead and tear gas canisters are exploding at the bottom of the fire escape.

World Voices in Seattle: 001 212 568 6191

World Voices

Telephone +44 (0)20 7928 8228

Fax +44 (0)20 7928 2882

Email uk@worldvoices.org

Online http:\\www.worldvoices.org

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: end message :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Capsules of Seattle Brutality clipped from the Toronto Media

LAURA LIVOTI, www.radioproject.org
Managing director of the National Radio Project, Livoti was interviewing activists and onlookers on the corner of 6th and Union in Seattle on Tuesday morning. As the police began massing in full riot gear, Livoti - wearing her WTO press credentials - was telling a police officer that she was a journalist. Still, a policeman [badge number 4409] hit her in the back with a baton. She was then sprayed directly in the face with pepper spray and was blinded for 15 minutes until an activist medic treated her. Said Livoti: "Despite the fact that the officer clearly knew that I was a working member of the press, he attacked me."

Teamster business agent Hobe Williams had just spied his mother on a passing bus. "I turned to wave. Suddenly I was pepper-sprayed. Right in the face," Mr. Williams said yesterday. "No warning. No provocation. Nothing. We were just marching down the street to a church."

"Everywhere I looked people were being beaten and gassed,'' said Jeanette Wallis, who lives in Capitol Hill on the edge of downtown.  The 28-year-old nurse was heading home from picking up a few groceries when she was caught up in a confrontation with police Wednesday night.  "We tried to escape down side streets, but there were police waiting there with mace,'' Wallis said yesterday morning, as she waited to take part in her first anti-trade protest.
People coming out of restaurants were shocked Wednesday night to find police running at them, and men could be seen running through the streets with babies in their arms trying to get away from the tear gas. "One gentleman was trying to put his baby in a car, and they maced him,'' Wallis said.  "We were singing Christmas carols when they lobbed the last tear gas,'' said Wallis, who hadn't paid much attention to the WTO protests, besides watching them on the television news.

Kaela Economos, 21, pulled out Polaroid snapshots showing a bleeding mouth and badly bruised nose. They were souvenirs, she said, from three police officers who grabbed her from behind as she talked to a friend, smashing Ms. Economos's face into the sidewalk.
"My two front teeth are almost horizontal. I can't protest today. I have to see my dentist."

Deanna Christian, a sweet-looking grandmother, was pepper-sprayed in the face as she stood on a street corner holding a sign proclaiming: "Democracy." "I suffer from asthma. I thought I was going to die," she said. "I was hysterical. I was terrified."

Residents of Seattle's trendy Capitol Hill were particularly angered that riot police invaded their district  firing off many rounds of tear gas at crowds well outside the downtown curfew zone.
King County Councillor Brian Derdowski was hit in the shoulder by a tear-gas canister. He said police tactics were asinine.

Marcher Kari Lerum, a professor of sociology at Seattle University, said several victims of the early-morning police attack in Capitol Hill sought refuge in her house. "One was suffering a panic attack. Another had just left a restaurant
when she was hit by a rubber bullet. You expect this in China and Indonesia, not in Seattle."

At King County jail, people were allegedly strapped into four-point restraint chairs as punishment for non-violent resistance or asking for their lawyers. In one case a man was stripped naked before being strapped into the chair.
One woman was stripped naked by four woman guards, while a male guard outside watched. She further had her arms and legs folded behind her and was held down on the floor with the full weight of two guards on top of her.
--------

WTO Arrests - Jailing of Federation Representatives Unwarranted
Newsflash -  Canadians arrested WTO-Seattle
From: Lucy Watson (Internal intern1) <intern1@CFS-FCEE.CA>
Thursday, December 02, 1999
   Ottawa - At least two Canadian student leaders were among hundreds arrested and jailed yesterday for peacefully protesting World Trade Organisation talks in Seattle.
   Canadian Federation of Students National Deputy Chairperson Elizabeth Carlyle and Newfoundland and Labrador Representative Jen Anthony, in Seattle as part of a Federation delegation, were arrested Wednesday morning while participating in a peaceful march more than two kilometres from the WTO meeting site.
   “We came to Seattle to demonstrate against the potential danger to higher education posed by the WTO negotiations,” said Anthony. “Exposing education to free trade will undoubtedly result in rapid tuition fee hikes and the further privatisation of higher education.”
   The WTO has emerged as an organisation with the potential to regulate all aspects of the global economy, including the provision of government funded social programmes. The Canadian Federation of Students has been consistently opposed to trade  agreements that threaten to supersede the will of individual citizens and undermine public services.
   “In every country where free trade agreements have been implemented, the living and working conditions of the population have worsened,” said Carlyle. “The violence that did break out on Tuesday is minor in comparison to the misery that a WTO agreement would create.
   Seattle Mayor Paul Schell has declared that Seattle is in “a state of civil emergency” and has extended a curfew until midnight Friday. By his own admission, peaceful protesters and residents have been caught in the crossfire of tear gas, pepper spray and rubber bullets. Media accounts state that least 600 people have been arrested.
   “There was only ever a small minority involved in the violence, and by Wednesday, most of it had stopped,” said Carlyle. “The real story is the police and the National Guard making indiscriminate sweeps, arresting everyone from protesters to coffee shop patrons.”
   The Federation is concerned that the curfew is being extended until Friday, the day the WTO negotiations conclude. “The actions of a few are being used as a pretext to prevent people from visibly demonstrating their opposition to the WTO talks,” said Carlyle.
   Carlyle and Anthony have yet to be arraigned. The Canadian Federation of Students is calling for the release of all those being held in connection with the events surrounding the anti-WTO demonstrations.
-
For further information, please contact Mark Veerkamp, British Columbia Chairperson at (604) 733-1880 or (604) 908-7223.
--------

I'm Still Ablaze
DATE: Wed, 01 Dec 1999 09:53:04
From: "Gabriel Taylor" 

Wednesday. My mind and body are still ablaze from the events of yesterday that impacted me in an irreversible and amazing way.

Call me for a more detailed report, but here are the basics of my story.

First of all the media is full of lies. There were about 100,000 people there. Maybe 200 of them were violent and destructive the other 99.8% of the people were involved in non-violent protest. Of those people about 20,000 were involved in a highly organized and peaceful act of civil disobedience. That is where I was.

I met up with one of the several marches heading for downtown on a dark and misty Seattle Tuesday morning around 7:00 AM. There were a few hundred people there at first, banging on empty water jugs, hefting signs, banners, and puppets, and chanting protest of the WTO. We marched through the streets of downtown Seattle making our way toward the convention center and being led by the protest organizers. We swelled in numbers quickly as more protesters arrived on the scene and marches merged in intersections until there were thousands of us. I happened to be pretty near the front holding up one half of a banner that I had made that read:

UNITE

for democracy

RESIST

the corporate agenda

The march went past several police barricades made up of metro busses and cement barriers staggered in the streets and manned by formations of cops wearing flak, riot helmets, and gasmasks. They carried long riot batons made from high impact plastic (I asked one), canisters of tear gas, fire extinguishers, def-tek 38 caliber weapons capable of deploying rubber bullets and chemicals, handguns, and plastic zip-ties.

At each barricade we came to the march left a bunch of protesters who started forming human barricades by linking their arms together. The numbers at the front of the march dwindled as these barricades were formed. I was among the first 50 people to arrive at the barricade in front of the Roosevelt hotel (where the WTO delegates were staying) and one of the Convention center entrances. The cops there were King county Sheriff and they were REALLY, REALLY nervous. They were totally tense and locked defensive stance with their feet planted wide apart and riot batons across their torsos. They did not say a word; they just kept anyone from getting past them. We argued a little bit with them, but thanks to one energetically non-violent protester dressed as a gray squirrel super-hero, the peaceful mood was set. We told the cops that we loved them and that they were doing a good job as we formed our barricade.

The barricade began with one row of linked protesters. It grew to two rows quickly. The front row was blocking the entrances to the hotel and the entire street. The rear row formed a peace barricade that served as a buffer zone between the protesters and the cops. I was on the peace barricade, two feet from the riot batons and tear gas canisters, with a piece of wet cloth over my mouth and nose imprinted with an anti-WTO slogan.

The tactical ops van for the protest was set up in the intersection right in front of us. It turned out that the barricade I had joined was to be the center of the civil disobedience and the most powerful force in shutting down the WTO. The white protester van had generators in the back and began pumping out loud music. It was a rhythmic pulsing drum beat with a little bass. Organizers standing on top of the van communicated support, information, and advice to the barricades through microphones and loudspeakers. WTO delegates trying to get into the convention center of into the hotel were throwing themselves at the line, bouncing off of our arms in total futility. Things started getting really tense and loud as tens of thousands of people finished forming a human barricade that totally surrounded the convention center. Billionaire international bankers, industrialists, and slave-labor using environment destroyers were screaming at me and shoving me, wanting to get into their hotel, but I wouldn't let them. I just kept saying things like: "take the day off, buddy, your meetings have been cancelled" or "You are not welcome here until you meet the people's demands" or "There is NO way you're getting past me, give it up"

It was exhilarating. These middle aged power-suit wearing capitalists who had gotten very used to getting their way were screaming at me to move and I was smiling back and refusing, 100% certain that there was absolutely nothing they could do.

In one barricade (not mine) a delegate actually pulled a gun on the protesters and started waving it at the crowd. They still didn't move. You won't hear that on the news. Also won't hear about the cops firing rubber bullets and tear gas canisters from 38 caliber weapons at protesters' chests and faces at point blank range. Protesters on barricades (not mine) got rubber bullets through sternums, jaws, cheeks, teeth, and ribs. Riot batons were smashing heads, arms, and bodies on the barricades when they drifted too close to the police line.

Our barricade was the most successful one of the entire battle. I say that with total confidence because the organizers were constantly updating us on the events around. When the tear gas from around the corner drifted into our line and pain and fear crept into me, the guy on the loudspeaker was there informing us that the cops had tear-gassed a barricade on 6th Street nearby and that they were likely coming our way. The barricade under tear gas held firm (that one at least) as the protesters sat down in the street and refused to move. One barricade became violent as the tear-gas caused panic and trampling. Some protesters began hurling chunks of broken cement at the cops and subsequently increased the level of violent retaliation. Our barricade was the only one that didn't let a single person by all day. I stood there from about 7:30 am to around 5:00 pm and wouldn't let anyone go by. We were also the only barricade that didn't get gassed or shot at because of our successful use of the peace barricade between the cops and the protesters. I was calmly talking to these cops assuring them that I wanted no one to get hurt and that I would NOT try to cross their line, nor would I let anyone else. They told me they wouldn't club me or shoot me so long as I didn't and that they were glad that our peace barricade was there acting as a buffer zone and increasing their visibility into the loud and chaotic streets.

That didn't stop me from worrying as I heard the orders on their radios and the protesters police scanners to get ready to gas us. I'd hear the cops grumble in fear as they placed their gas masks on their faces and readied the canisters and the defensive line. But time and time again, they decided it wasn't necessary to gas us.

International press agents, WTO delegates, delegates' families, and Seattle citizens and protesters all had to stop at these barricades; the people would simply NOT let anyone by. The protesters were asked by loud chanting amid the explosions, announcements, and music to join the lines, and they did. Rappers stood on top of the van and preached the people's needs and demands to the crowds to the throbbing beat of the music. During some of the interludes of relative peace, fire-breathers and dancers paraded around while buckets of soup were distributed to the barricades by men on bicycles. Legal observers were strategically placed with their "legal observer" t-shits and notepads at every barricade.

Around 11:00 am the AFL-CIO march went through. It took over an hour for the 60,000 union members to march by blasting music from radios, bagpipes, and loudspeakers. The teamsters drove a couple big rigs through the heart of the march, blasting their air horns, bringing everyone's spirits up as we saw these giant machines on OUR side with anti-WTO slogans flying from the exhaust pipes.

Our spirits were high. We were shutting those fuckers down and we knew it. It was working, and despite the exhaustion and the burning of our eyes and lungs, we found this powerful feeling of unity and above all else STRENGTH in our solidarity on the barricades.

Michael Moore, the media activist (not to be confused with Mike Moore the Secretary General of the WTO) arrived at our barricade surrounded by hundreds of people and cameras. He wanted to talk to the cops behind us. We refused to let him by but asked him to join our line. He stood there for a while letting activists get some precious air time (still less air time that the WTO reps are getting) and gave us his support before answering a call for more people blocking the entrance to an alleyway around the corner.

There was destruction and violence for sure. Sledgehammers through windows, Molotov cocktails into police lines, and spray-painted anti WTO slogans all over most buildings in the protest area downtown. ...of course THIS is the material that makes the news. Not the barricades, not the non-violence, not the point blank shooting of peaceful women and men, but the vandals and looters.

Beware of what you hear on the media. The networks are trying to turn this into another LA riot story when it was most certainly NOT. Not during the day at least. I was there. Dead center. Front line. Eyes open. Ask me if you have any questions about this history making incident that united labor, the environment, human rights, feminism, and a whole spectrum and anti-corporate agenda activists.

solidarity. -gabe

Eyewitness account of nonviolent action at WTO
Peter Bergel of the Oregon PeaceWorker
http://www. teleport.com/~opw

Dear Friends,
Here is an account of the WTO actions in Seattle from my perspective. I have been doing nonviolence training for several days and I was on the street all day today. -- Peter
_________________

Notes on 11-30-99 WTO Protest Actions
Overall Impressions

* The protests today represented a new beginning of cooperation between labor, environmental, peace, human rights and other groups. Many were represented and worked together very well. * The direct action was carried out by mainly young activists who had been trained for the week before and handled themselves superbly, by and large. They were disciplined, radical, well-educated and had a good grasp of the value of nonviolence, at least as a tactic. I found that they knew a remarkable amount about WTO, free trade, capitalism and related topics. * The City of Seattle's downtown area was completely shut down. The people took over the streets and the police were not able to exercise more than token control over them. * For the most part, the police behaved well. They were seriously outnumbered, stressed, provoked at times and probably felt frightened. Nevertheless, they used force sparingly and overstepped the need infrequently. * The protesters did a magnificent job of policing themselves. The minor outbreaks of violent anger were contained by the demonstrators with surprising skill and commitment. * The WTO meetings were seriously impacted. The opening was delayed, many delegates were prevented from attending at all, and those who did could not get to their meetings without running the gantlet of angry protesters making their message clear in both mass and invidual ways. * It was probably a very significant day in the history of people's power, "free" trade evolution and defense of democracy.

Personal Experiences

After gathering at Steinbrueck Park at 7 a.m. today, we marched downtown in a huge march which stretched for many blocks. How many I couldn't tell from my position within it, but we were only half of the total since another march started from another location, converging on the WTO meeting place from another direction.

Once downtown, we split into different sub-groups to occupy different parts of downtown. The area around the WTO had been divided into thirteen sectors with clusters of affinity groups (small autonomous action groups) responsible for deciding upon _ and carrying out _ a blockade of their sector. My group marched around downtown a bit and wound up in front of the Sheraton Hotel, where many delegates were staying. Human blockades were set up by dedicated affinity groups at every entrance, including the parking garage. Protesters lined up across the entrances, linked arms and stood their ground. At several points there were face-to-face standoffs between protesters and police. The police wore face shields, gas masks (at times) and body armor and carried long sticks, sidearms, pepper spray and sometimes plastic riot shields. The protesters wore old clothes, rain protection and bandannas against tear gas. Some were wildly costumed and a few had gas masks.

There was some pushing and rough stuff now and then when delegates tried to get out of the hotel or get back in. Protesters tried to prevent any entry or egress and sometimes the delegates tried to push through. When they did, police interfered, if they were close by.

About 10 a.m. tear gas was used by the police to clear the immediate area. By that time I had moved up the street and was not gassed. When the gas dispersed, I went back down to find out what had occasioned the use of the gas. It had been used to clear the intersection along Union to afford meeting access to some WTO delegates. However, rather few of them appeared to be using it. The police lined both sides of the intersection to keep it clear. As the delegates walked through, the crowd booed them loudly and then began shouting "shame, shame." A few minutes later, another tear gas attack back up the street drove people down toward my position and the gas followed them. I was gassed slightly.

As I walked around downtown, I found that practically every intersection was filled with people dancing, drumming and blockading and the numbers were truly amazing. The police were mostly holding various lines and not letting people through them. Then periodically they would use tear gas to clear an area. People would leave the area, circle around to another block and come back when the gas dispersed. The police would shortly abandon the intersection they had just secured and move to another one and the process would begin again. The upshot of this was that the police were unable to protect much of anything at all, yet hey could not spare the manpower to arrest demonstrators without losing control of the areas they were trying to protect. The downtown was firmly in the protesters' hands and it was clear that without the consent of the governed not much could be accomplished, if enough of the governed decided to resist.

Some of the signs that impressed me included:

* The Senators who ratified the WTO Treaty should be tried for treason.

* Do YOU remember voting for the WTO?

* Keep the sweatshop in the sauna.

* More health, less wealth.

* I hope you can eat your money.

* No legislation without representation.

I saw two police cars parked in the street as part of a police counter blockade. One had a flat rear tire and both had such graffiti as "Pig" and "Fuck cops" spray-painted to them. There was also some glass breakage,overturning of dumpsters and paper boxes and defacing of buildings, but the damage was trivial considering the huge numbers of people in the area, the anger that the tear-gassing triggered and the wealth of those against which the property damage was directed. More important, though, was the response of the demonstrators to virtually every outbreak of property damage or hot-headedness. Demonstrators moved immediately to quell property damage and equally determinedly to break up conflicts. Others immediately began to chant "Nonviolent protest! Nonviolent protest! The effect was to put the rowdier elements on notice that their tactics were not appreciated by the vast majority of those present. I even saw a line of demonstrators link arms to successfully protect the windows of a VoiceStream Wireless store from window-breakers.

The favorite chant of the day was "Hey, hey! Ho, ho! WTO has got to go!" Not too imaginitive, perhaps, but easy to learn and it had a good rhythm. At one point, a group sang the Star Spangled Banner. When they got to the line about the land of the free, people stopped singing and went into wild applause. Another favorite chant was "Whose streets? Our streets! Whose streets? Our streets!"

Crowd size estimates on the news seem to have been characteristically small: one early report said there were 5,000 downtown in the morning. I would guess the number at 4-6 times that, though that is only a guess. All I can say is that all the streets I went to were full of people and I would guess that a tightly packed block would probably hold about 1,000 people. Even a loosely packed block would have to have 3-400 in it. And there were blocks like that up and down many streets. I can't imagine there were less than 10-20,000 downtown in the morning and possibly as many as 30,000. Then there must have been a good 40-50,000 in the "Big" labor march which came downtown in the afternoon. That would boost the count to 50-60,000, maybe even as high as 70,000. Honest estimates based on helicopter pictures could be made, but I don't know if they will be.

In many intersections, protesters "locked down." They connected themselves to each other and to heavy blocks or concrete-filled pipes to make it impossible for the police to move them. This was another reason the cops didn't arrest people. They just couldn't. Some of those locked down were still in the intersections when the police used tear gas in the area and they just had to endure it.

I spoke briefly to a WTO delegate from Trinidad and Tobago _ a small country of less than 2,000 square miles _ which has what he called "manageable debt." He seemed to understand what we were protesting about quite well. Especially he understood the trade-offs forced by the requirements of debt repayment.

People on the streets were often very helpful towards one another, sharing water, helping them out of areas in which they didn't want to be, washing each other's eyes and so on. A few medical types are carrying saline solution for severe tear gas victims. There are also legal observers wearing specially printed white T-shirts and taking notes on what they see going on.

Two kinds of tear gas seemed to be in use. One was whitish-grey and seemed to remain relatively local where it was shot. The other was dark, almost black, and seemed to blanket much larger areas quickly. It obscures vision like smoke even if you don't get anywhere near it.

I heard many fascinating conversations about the relative power of violence and nonviolence. It was wonderful to hear so many people who weren't me carrying the defense of nonviolence in these circumstances.

In some places there was plastic yellow tape marked "Police crime scene. Do not cross." In many others there was identical looking tape which said instead, "Unseen crimes."

A very disciplined drum corps with drums, cymbals, flags and a whistle-blowing majorette dressed in dark, revolutionary-looking clothing showed up from time to time throughout the day. They would march in tight formation along the street, playing and responding to the whistled commands of the majorette. Then, at a whistled signal, they would begin to deploy in various patterns. They were entertaining, clever, humorous and good at what they do. At one point, as they marched down a street, they suddenly veered sharply left and walked right into Starbucks, playing and marching around several times to the shock of the customers, some of which left at once.

The vanguard of the "Big" march arrived downtown about 1:30, occupying the whole street. Although it came in fits and starts, it flowed past my vantage point for 50 minutes before I found my Salem friends and joined them. We looped through a number of blocks of downtown and then began to head out of downtown a block over from where the march came in. To my amazement, we could see a steady stream still coming in! It was 2:45. I left the march and stood on the corner to view the rest of the march. By 3 p.m. the march's end had passed the point at which is could see it entering downtown a block up the street. However, it was still another 20 minutes before the end passed my vantage point. This means that a march that often filled the entire street took about an hour and a half to pass one point. Could that be less than 50,000?

I saw signs for at least these unions: steelworkers, electrical workers, teachers, bricklayers, ILWU (Longshoremen), painters, Stanford workers, service employees, teamsters, sheet metal workers, marine engineers, transit workers, boilermakers, plumbers steamfitters and refigerations workers, public service workers of Canada, cement masons, pulp paper and woodworkers, nurses, Canadian airways workers and carpenters.

When the march had left, I went back to one of the lockdowns on 6th Avenue right next to the Sheraton Hotel. There were still a lot of people downtown. There were clearly less than before, but they still filled many blocks and the occupation continued. At one point there was a disturbance as two men appeared to be trying to break though a line of protesters which was linked to prevent delegates from getting past. Behind them was a line of police. There was a scuffle and I went right over there to see if I could help maintain the peace. One of the two fell down and immediately got up, very freaked out. I began to calm him only to have my attention drawn to the other who was a few feet away. His suit coat was open and he had a sidearm holster from which he had already removed the gun. It was pointing down, but I had a moment of serious fear as I realized that, should he raise the weapon, I would be right in his immediate line of fire. However, he did not raise it. Rather, he and the other man crossed through the police line and were gone. The crowd had responded at once, shouting "He's got a gun. He's got a gun." and pointing. The police responded by spraying the entire scene, including me, with pepper spray. Although I have seen tear gas a number of times before, I had never confronted pepper spray before. It's pretty painful just to have on your skin. It must be really awful to have in your eyes.

At 5 p.m., the police moved to clear the entire area. They began firing off large amounts of tear gas and people began to run down 6th. A number of us shouted for them to walk to prevent panic and stampede. Then we moved slowly out of the area. The tear gas overtook us and I was gassed more heavily this time. The stuff isn't as nasty as what they used to use in the 60s, but it's bad enough. Shortly after that I left. I later heard that the police used gas to clear most of the protesters out, but some remained and the day's first arrests took place that evening. I heard numbers like 22 and 25 _ a tiny number considering how many had been there during the day. Taken as a whole, the day was an unquestioned success. The WTO could not help but get the message about how they were viewed by the many thousands present. Moreover, they had not been able to agree on their agenda before they arrived for this meeting and then they lost a good deal of yesterday because the downtown area was so congested and even more of today due to delays and absence of delegates.

Thanks for reading this far, if you have. Please forward this to people who should be informed.

Thank you.

Peter Bergel

---------

No globalization without representation
Wed, 01 Dec 1999 13:59:40 EST
From: Free Student Press Project
<freestudentpress@hotmail.com>

I got on a Greyhound bus in Pittsburgh at 3:00 am, the morning after Thanksgiving, and traveled 2 and a half days to Seattle to join the protests against the World Trade Organization. I arrived to see tens of thousands of activists from the widest range of causes I've ever seen in one place, united around a common concern -- their desire to have a say in the decisions that affect their lives, otherwise known as democracy. I won't go into the WTO in great detail. The information is out there. You can find for yourself that in the last 4 years the WTO has been in existence it has ruled against every environmental and human health and safety regulation that has come before it and, through economic leverage, has compelled countries to repeal these "barriers to free trade." Such barriers in this country have been the sections of the Clean Air Act and the Endangered Species Act. But I won't go into that further, instead I want to share with you what happened here, to me and thousands of others, yesterday.

My friends and I woke up late Tuesday morning. One of the largest protests of the century, and we sleep in. We joined the protests at about 9:00 am, and joined a human chain of people blocking one entrance to the convention center where the first day of the WTO summit was to take place. This was the scene at every street that led to the convention center. The plan was to not let delegates enter and to shut down the meeting. This may sound drastic, but the purpose was to send a message that many have phrased as "No globalization without representation." The WTO meetings are closed to the public and the WTO is not subordinate to any national government or, more importantly, and democratic body. Yet it has shown itself to have more of a say in things as basic as the quality of the air we breath than we ourselves do. To me and nearly 50,000 others, this warranted the serious direct action. However, as serious as these demonstrations were, they were to be ALL non-violent.

After being part of our own barrier to free trade and turning back WTO delegates for about an hour, we heard that protesters needed help at another intersection a few blocks away. Since there were more than enough people to keep up the barrier where we were, we left the blockade and headed for the corner of 8th and Seneca. When we arrived, we saw lots of demonstrators but no major media cameras. There was a smaller group of people sitting down on the street (which had already been closed) with police in riot gear standing behind them. Instead of the ordinary billy clubs, all of Seattle's police were holding 3 foot oak clubs that look more like baseball bats than batons. When they began putting on their gas masks it became evident that they were planning to use pepper spray on the people sitting down. The rest of the crowd was pleading with the police not to use this cruel tactic. It was possible that if more people sat down, they police wouldn't spray them, so I joined that group. When it became apparent that they were going to use the spray anyway, we all locked legs and arms together and I pulled a bandana my friend had given me over my face, covering my mouth and eyes. Onlookers began yelling, "Get ready! They going to do it! Get ready!" I heard the spray and people began screaming in pain. I was just expecting spray, so I was pretty surprised when I felt one of those big clubs land on the top of my head. The guy behind me took most of the force from the blow, so I wasn't hurt badly. I covered my head with my arm and covered my eyes with my hand, as the screams continued and it became obvious -even though I couldn't see anything from underneath my bandana- that the cops were not only spraying but beating the people as well. A police officer then grabbed my hand and pulled it away from my face and sprayed me in the eyes with a canister of pepper spray. I held my eyes closed tight and my bandana absorbed the spray, protecting my eyes and face. I breathed a little bit of it in and began coughing. the crowd started to break up as the police continued beating people. I pulled away and stood up, pulling the bandana away from my eyes to see the police beating the few people that remained sitting. One woman was trying to get up and they kept jabbing her in the side with their clubs. The rest of the crowd pulled those people to safety and began washing their eyes with a solution of baking soda and water to counter the effects of the blinding pepper spray. This was my first experience with the spray. I got a tiny bit of the spray on my forehead and it burnt very badly, was very painful. I can't even begin to imagine the pain the people felt who got it sprayed directly into their eyes. I think I was luckier than anyone else I was sitting with, having escaped the spray and only having been clubbed once.

I screamed at the cops for a while, called them fascist pigs between plenty of other expletives. But when things calmed down a bit, myself and others began speaking to the police. It suddenly became evident that some of them were visibly disturbed by what they had just done. One female officer's hands were shaking as she held her club up to her chest like the rest did in the line they had formed. She kept blinking her eyes to avoid crying. We talked to other officers who wouldn't look us in the eyes, but their faces showed no signs of pleasure.

After I calmed down a bit and got my emotions under control enough to speak, I said to them, "You probably think we're just fanatics with nothing better to do, or maybe vagrants who are too lazy to be working right now, or maybe spoiled college kids who don't have to work. You can think that we're idiots who came across a few statistics on environmental degradation or sweatshops, that we're out here today to be self-righteous and think that we're better than everybody else, but we're people just like you. And everybody standing here with me knows exactly why they're here today. We're trying to make the world better. And I don't think a single one of you even knows why you're here. How many of you support the WTO? How many of you even know what it does? We know why we're here. Why the hell are you here? I don't think any of you became police officers to beat people who aren't a threat to anyone's safety. Just who do you think you're protecting? We're unarmed. None of us have tried to attack you or anyone else today. You attacked us. You aren't protecting yourselves; there's no one behind you that you're protecting -- Who do you think you're protecting!? If you have a good reason for beating us today, if you felt it was right, that's one thing. But if you didn't have any reason and you still beat these people anyway, I want you to ask yourself why you did it. Why you were willing to inflict violence on other people for no reason other than you were told to?"

I asked them to go home and think about that; what they did to make things better today by beating non-violent protesters; if that's what they became cops to do. They were all silent, turning they heads constantly to avoid eye contact with any of the protesters speaking.

The commanding officer walked down a line in between the police and us, pushing protesters back. He ordered the crowd to disperse, saying that if we didn't leave they would remove us by force. We didn't leave. We just kept talking to the police more. I asked the commanding officer to explain to us why we ought to leave. He didn't acknowledge the question. I asked them all if that's what those clubs meant, that they didn't have to explain their actions to anyone, even themselves. Other protesters reminded them that even though they were trained to be robots, they were still people who were responsible for their own actions -- orders or no orders. I told them my name, where I was from, that I go to college, that I have family and friends. I asked them their names. None answered.

We stayed there and the police didn't charge. Not because I think we convinced them not to, but because there were too many of us. Soon a group of people with their arms chained together inside tubes wrapped in duct tape. Four of these people were from Athens; three OU students and friends of mine. The police were still threatening to charge the crowd. I quickly realized that these people had no way to protect their heads from the police clubs. Being obviously violent had already proven to be no defense against police violence. Another OU student and I walked up to the police line to ask them about this. The line was now made up of different police officers.

We approached one and asked him about this. He looked at us and said, "Well, if they're worried about getting hurt, they should have thought about that before they came out today." I asked him to show me his badge number. He refused. "Aren't you required to show your identification to the public?" He didn't answer. The officer to his left sneered at me and said, "Well you have all the answers, why don't you tell me?" Before I could, he raised his club and yelled at me to back up. I did and continued talking to him, but he looked away and ignored me. The first officer had no identifying number anywhere on him. No visible badge, no number on his helmet. I took his picture and got others to. Telling everybody that we needed to watch him.

When I first spoke to police after they had beaten us, I was very encouraged that some had actually shown some signs of human compassion, but my hopefulness disappeared after I talked to the latter group of officers and realized that many of them were quite happy to inflict harm on people. Reinforcements came and as protesters cleared the way for them, one cop pushed a protester, and said "Get the fuck out of my way," with a smile on his face.

From time to time ambulances would come through, and the crowd would clear a path immediately. Some protesters said, "What if WTO delegates are sneaking in in the ambulances?" But people came to an immediate consensus that, although that was a possibility, it wasn't worth risking people's safety. Suddenly, a WTO delegate made it unnoticed through our lines. But when he made it to police they refused to let him enter. They turned back another delegate later. As it turned out, we were guarding an exit not an entrance; that they police's orders were to not let anyone in -- whoever they were. Also, since police had shut down the street and no protesters had attempted to cross police lines, none of us were even doing anything illegal. -- which is probably why none of the people in the sit-down group were arrested. Though none of us were arrested, all of us were beaten and sprayed.

Word soon made it to us that the situation was worse elsewhere. We made our way to the heart of downtown and found the streets full of tear gas. There was a large group of people sitting down in front of police in full riot gear with their gas masks on. Behind them was an armored tank. They police attacked protesters again. Against non-violent protesters, they used pepper spray, clubs, tear gas, and later fired rubber bullets and marbles at the people. In every single instance I witnessed first hand, police violently attacked non-violent protesters with no provocation whatsoever. That was the case when I was beaten and sprayed, that was the case when downtown was flooded with gas, with helicopters flying overhead shining spotlights down into the crowd. Thousands of police forced protesters out of the downtown area firing canister after canister of tear gas into the crowd. My friends and I were split up in the crowd of people fleeing from the gas. eventually, I made it back to the house to join them.

The whole way to their house, I was hoping that this story would get out. Hoping that the level of violence inflicted on non-violent protesters, peacefully assembled, would wake a lot of people up and show them the level of democracy in this country. Hoping that people would see what the level of force aimed at people who peacefully oppose the interests that are dominant in this country and the world. I returned home to have this hope crushed. The local news stations were reporting on the broken windows of businesses and not the broken bones of protesters. They reported on things like "police fatigue." Which I assume is when your arms get tired after you beat people for hours. They talked -- and continue to talk about -- the extremely "restraint, open-mindedness, and gentleness" displayed by police.

A state of civil emergency was declared and a curfew was set for 7pm. If anyone was downtown after that, they would be arrested. Police cleared the curfew zone of people, but we watched them on TV continued to pursue them up Capitol Hill -- blocks past the curfew zone. The police chased them into a business area and fired tear gas into crowds that were now made up of shoppers and people getting dinner as well as protesters. Finally, after 12 hours of people being beaten and gassed, a small riot broke out. A Starbucks coffee store was damaged and looted. I'm amazed it took this long to happen, and I say this in all honesty from being here first hand, that, by repeatedly attacking and torturing non-violent protesters, the Seattle police sought to incite a riot and finally succeeded to a small degree. The news kept running the scene of Starbucks being looted again, and again, and again. At least a dozen times in under an hour. There were also quick clips of police beating demostrators shown once and not again.

A newscaster on KOMO, channle 4, said, "Look, earlier today we saw protesters carrying signs with clear messages against the WTO, but what you have going on now is an unruly mob just trying to cause problems. In the pictures we're seeing now, I don't see any signs at all. These people don't have any message." What the newscaster failed to notice was that people, myself included, dropped their signs when they were fleeing for their lives. They were dropped because you need two hands to guard your eyes from tears gas.

Talk of the "police being too lenient" has continued into today's news reports. And the lack of signs continues to be portrayed as a lack of any constructive purpose among the protesters. One newscaster said, "Come on, get a life. We live in a prosperous country."

In all honesty, the news is scaring me more than the riot police, because what it has done is justify further violence against the protesters. They have said that "police have been too lenient." The police have used teargas, pepper sprays, clubs, rubber bullets, and marbles against peaceful civilians in downtown Seattle. The only thing they haven't done is used live amunition. And in the event that greater violence occurs against protesters, the media will have justified it.

Besides insulting protesters the local media has focused on the disruption to traffic and holiday shopping. The National Guard is now occupying the city, a 50 block "no protest" zone has been established, about 120 people have been arrested, and many have been hospitalized -- though that has received no coverage as far as I've seen.

In other news, we succeeded in shutting down the first day of WTO meetings. The situation is still developing, so I encourage everyone to watch the news coverage and contrast it to what I've written here. AND PLEASE, do your own research on the WTO. --------

Seattle Occupation
Date: Thu, 02 Dec 1999 16:47:14 -0700
From: Gordon McGlothlen Organization: @Home Network

My friends,

Things have gotten very, very bad here. Seattle is in a state of police occupation. There are 500+ people being held without access to their attorneys in Sandpoint, an abandoned military complex in Seattle. Police are tear-gassing non-violent people without warning. Police will beat and gas anyone with a protest sign. You are not allowed to carry any signs or even SPEAK while you are on the streets of Seattle. People are being held in metro busses for days without access to attorneys. There are searches without warrants. Over fifty blocks of downtown Seattle have been blocked off by police and national guard barricades. Innocent people who aren't even protesting the WTO are being pepper sprayed in the faces for entering the streets to question police who are filling their homes with tear gas. Non-violent people are being shot in the faces at point blank range with 38 caliber weapons.

The Constitutional rights of these people have been totally ignored. We have a right to free speech. We have a right to peaceful assembly. We have a right to our attorneys. We have the right to not be searched without warrants. These rights have been lost. The brutality and violence on the streets of Seattle is in the form of tear gas, pepper spray, riot batons, rubber bullets, and illegal imprisonment.

The media portrays our struggle as a riot similar to the LA riots. The media has shown clips of looters and vandals a thousands times over without giving even a percent of the relative airtime that the non-violent protest deserves. The non-violent protest on Tuesday was a SUCCESS! We shut down the WTO for a day! The looters and vandals made up a very small portion of the anti-WTO people on the streets that day. The media attempts to discredit our success by making us look like a bunch of mindless bloodthirsty looters. We are not. We are a non-violent rational people with a unified cry for justice filling the streets.

The Seattle police dept., King County Sheriff, and the National Guard have retaliated against our non-violent action by imposing a military state upon Seattle that makes protest impossible by removing many of our Constitutional rights while causing untold misery upon the citizens of Seattle whether they be opposed to the WTO or not. President Clinton addresses the grievances of the protesters in his speeches while calling in the National Guard and allowing the rights of citizens to be stolen from them.

If protest is impossible in Seattle, it must be brought elsewhere. THIS PROTEST IS NO LONGER JUST IN OPPOSITION TO THE WTO!!! It must now address the atrocities being committed in Seattle by the City, County, State, and Federal government around the clock. People in Seattle are being violently removed from the streets!

In solidarity with the political prisoners in Sandpoint, we, the people of Bellingham, Washington are marching on the Federal Building tomorrow at noon to engage in an act of mass non-violent civil disobedience. I urge anyone who is in the area to attend and anyone outside of the area to lend us your support by protesting the treatment of the citizens of Seattle in your own community. This movement has brought tens of thousands of people together from many different walks of life and political interests. The City, County, State, and Federal governments in response to demands from the WTO have responded to this popular cry for justice with illegal force and violence.

DO NOT BELIEVE WHAT YOU SEE ON THE MAJOR NETWORKS!!! I have witnessed these lies firsthand. 99% of the protesters in Seattle are employing non-violent forms of resistance to the WTO. This right has been removed from them. Take up the protest wherever you may be. If there is one thing I learned on Tuesday it was that the people united are far more powerful than anything that can stand in their way.

Solidarity

-Gabriel Taylor

--I am collecting testimonies from protesters present at Tuesday's demonstration. -gabe

Rage Against Corporate America
DATE: Fri, 3 Dec 1999 08:53:18
From: Chad McCulley To: chomolungma@angelfire.com

My name is Matt Harmon-Craig. I am a student at Western Washington University and went down to Seattle to protest the World Trade Organization on Tuesday. I went down because I think that we are living in a time when corporations have been enthroned in our justice and political system. Corporations are both protected by the Bill of Rights and have more access to our elected officials then any "normal" person in our country. In my studies of the WTO's decisions and policies it has become clear to me that the WTO is simply the lap dog of the multi-national corporations whose motive is only profit maximization. I started marching on Seattle at about 7 am and several thousand of us went from intersection to intersection dropping off protesters by the hundreds at each one to blockade the delegates from getting in. The first blockade I was a part of was where the busses were acting as sort of a wall blockade between the police and the protestors. After about a half hour of frustrating shouts against the WTO about fifteen turtles armed with a ladder charged the busses and climbed onto the top of them with about fifty protestors following behind. Shouts of "hurray turtles" filled the air. I stayed on top of the bus for about a half hour looking down upon the line of riot cops just on the other side.

During the rest of the day my affinity group would go back to tactical and find out where the delegates were breaking through the blockade and go to where they were understaffed. I only saw one act of violence against the police and the man who was about to throw a stick at the police found himself quickly surrounded by about ten non-violent protestors as people chanted non-violence. His stick was quickly pulled from his hand. I saw the black clad people smashing windows and spray painting. The feeling I got from this crowd, though I didn't condone their actions, was that these were not random acts of violence. They were directed actions of violence against certain corporations for specifc political reasons. The actions of violence by the police against the non-violent protestors I saw were emense. The police never targeted the black-clad people who were doing the damage, they only attacked the 99% of the 50,000 who were acting non-violently. During the day, as I was chanting "no violence," I ended up getting gassed six different times. People around me got shot with rubber pellets. The sixth time I got gassed I had to retreat as a medic sprayed baby oil on my face. At the top of the street well away from the police we recovered from the tear gas. The people in the blockade i had just fled were staying and crying because the tear gas had gone off so close to where they were. Then, for some reason, the police broke through the protest line. About six officers on horses charged through the protest line to escort two sheriffs cars through the blockade. The protestors that were sitting down got trampled by the horses. Their riot sticks were in the air and they took a swing at anyone that got close. I walked out into the street near the horse officers as they rode by and began chanting "the whole world is watching." An officer took a swing at me but missed by about four feet. He then pulled the horse alongside me and pointed the baton at my face about six inches form my nose. He was saying something thorugh his gas mask (I still don't understand how the horses can stand the tear gas without masks) but I drowned him out with my chanting. A legal observer asked the officer's badge number but they rode off back through the protestors once the sheriff cars had gotten through. We walked around the perimeter of the protest for a few more hours but then left before the curfew.

The police started using tear gas sometime between 8 and 9 am on Tuesday, November 30th and never stopped. I saw on the television the violence that they committed over the next few days. If the World Trade Organization cannot meet without having to enforce a police state then I think that is fairly indicative of how much of a problem the people of the world have with it. A similiar story happened in Geneva, Switzerland at their second meeting. Then to enforce a "no protest" zone where your first amendment rights are revoked makes a mockery of the constitution and democracy. If the people cannot simply stand on the street and say this is wrong then they own us. We are their crops and we are being farmed. The lesson I learned from Seattle is that our government is scared. The poeple are slowly begining to realize that as the Dow Jones is skyrocketing the majority of the people in America have found their incomes stagnating or declining. Environmental problems are getting worse. The organization demonstrated by the protestors I'm sure have an entire army of FBI men working on how they could not have known this was going to happen. As rage against corporate America grows and orgainzation against it becomes clearer and better the official response is to clamp on the lid tighter and tighter. It gives one the feeling of being on a runaway machine.

permission to copy, print, etc. ----------------

Collateral Damage in Seattle & Report from Portland student Jim Desyllas
(posted 12-2-99)
From: "Janet M Eaton" 
1] Subject: FW: Collateral Damage in Seattle

Collateral Damage in Seattle

Report from Portland student Jim Desyllas (posted 12-2-99)

Called-in from a pay phone outside Seattle. Wed., 7:30 pm Pacific time.

I just spent 4 days in Seattle. The "information" people are getting from the mass media is false. This was not, as Pres. Clinton claims, a peaceful protest marred by the actions of violent protesters. This was a massive, strong but peaceful demonstration which was attacked repeatedly by the police with the express purpose of provoking a violent response to provide photo opportunities for the Western media. I know because I watched it happening. I'll tell you how they did it.

As Michel Chossudovsky says in his "Disarming the New World Order" (See Note # 1 at end for link to that article) - the government put a lot of effort into making sure the protesters in Seattle were a "loyal opposition" who wanted to reform the WTO, not get rid of it. But the people in Seattle - American steel workers, Canadian postal workers, college kids from all over, environmentalists from Australia - - you name it - were not for reforming the WTO. They were for getting rid of it.

And this wasn't just true of the protesters. I interviewed delegates. None of them had anything favorable to say about the WTO. Two delegates from the Caribbean were angry about job loss. One delegate from Peru took a bullhorn and got up on a car and spoke to the protestors against the World Trade Organization. He said it hurts the workers and farmers. I interviewed a Norwegian guy from Greenpeace. Totally against it. Even a delegate from Holland said it had hurt the farmers there. He said though it is supposedly democratic, that's actually a lie: the US, England and Canada and a few others get together and decide what they want to do. Then they ask the rest of the countries to vote and if they vote wrong they threate