Police fight running battles with protesters and break up demos with tear gas as WTO negotiations reach climax
Tom Burgis and Jonathan Watts in Hong Kong | Sunday December 18, 2005 | The Observer
Hong Kong was hit by its most violent street clashes in more than 30 years last night as riot police fought running battles with protesters on the penultimate day of World Trade Organisation talks.
While negotiators inside the conference hall struggled to agree to a watered-down compromise on the future of global commerce, demonstrators outside ratcheted up their attempt to derail a deal that they believe sells poor countries short.
The result was the fiercest fighting this normally sedate commercial city has seen since the 1960s.
Police Commissioner Dick Lee said 41 people - including five police - were injured, but only two of them needed to be kept in hospital. Lee said police have detained 900 people and were determining whether to formally arrest them. 'If necessary we will make arrests. We will not let them go easily,' he said.
Police used water cannon, tear gas and pepper spray to repulse protesters - mostly Korean farmers - who tried to break through their lines with iron bars, wooden poles and battering rams made from steel security barriers.
With the clashes spread out over several hours and locations, there were numerous injuries, including several Koreans and police with bloody head wounds, and a woman who lost consciousness amid a thick, acrid cloud of tear gas. At one point, protesters smashed their way through police lines and entered the outer buildings of the convention centre. However, they were quickly driven out by police using truncheons - and according to one unconfirmed report - rubber bullets.
Miles of roads were cordoned off in the emergency, preventing trade delegates - at least temporarily - from entering or leaving the conference hall at a crucial stage in negotiations. 'The enemy have gathered near here,' explained one young police officer. 'There are hundreds of them, so we have blocked the roads.'
The fighting transformed a whole stretch of the city. The red-light strip of Wan Chai was eerily deserted. Instead of the usual Saturday-night hustle and bustle of prostitutes, strippers and punters, the area was locked down by thousands of grim-faced riot police.
The shopping and dining area of Causeway Bay was similarly blocked off. Instead of traffic and shoppers, the streets echoed with ambulence sirens, the buzz of police helicopters, the rhythmic drumming beaten out by Korean farm women in traditional dress, and the occasional dull crack of a tear gas round.
'We had a permit to protest, but midway along our route the police blocked our way. That is why there was violence,' said Rex Verona of the Asian Migrants Forum. 'Now is a critical moment in the negotiations. We will not allow governments and negotiators to sell us out.'
The demonstrators' anger has been stirred up by reports that negotiators are moving closer to a compromise package that does not include the key demand of many NGOs: an end to European and American agriculture subsidies that are destroying the livelihood of farmers in poor countries. Although there may be a small aid package to ease the disappointment, the most important issues related to global inequality are likely to be deferred to a make-or-break meeting early next year, while the main demands of wealthy nations - related to the service and manufacturing sectors - are pushed to the fore.
It is still far from clear that a deal can be agreed before tomorrow's deadline. The demonstrators want wavering countries - particularly Venezuela, Indonesia, Cuba, South Africa and the Philippines - to veto the plan.
'This protest is geared to strengthen the resistance of developing countries inside the conference centre, so they can block the awful deal that is being discussed,' said Walden Bellow, director of Focus on the Global South, who held out a copy of the proposal on the front line of the demonstration.
Despite the conservative and peace-loving reputation of Hong Kong, many local people who saw the clashes sympathised with the demonstrators.
Dozens joined the protests, some wearing surgical face masks for the first time since the Sars crisis, but this time to conceal their identity and protect themselves against tear gas.
'I'm ready to join the front line,' said one 20-year-old student who gave his name only as Z. 'I've never done this before, but I listen to the anti-globalisation lyrics of bands like Franco American. I'm angry at the WTO.'
Late last night hundreds of protesters were still on the streets: some lying down, some chanting, some drumming, many promising to stay there until morning if that was what it took to get their message across to the delegates.
'We would just like to march to the front of the convention centre so that we can express our opinion,' said Lee Chang Eun, of the Korean Federation of Trade Unions.
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