[T]he deepening economic and systemic crisis of capitalism not only takes the form of increasing militarization and war. It also finds expression in the stepped-up state attack on the democratic rights of the people. Whether in the form of overt repression(police attacks on picket lines and street demonstrations), or through less crude or obvious legal-judicial means (use of court injunctions, wilful manipulation of the electoral process, etc.), or the promotion of ultra-right, racist and neo-fascist groupings or even paramilitary units, the class purpose remains the same: to stifle the democratic expressions and aspirations of the masses, to weaken the labour and democratic fightback, and to silence and, where necessary, crush anti-capitalist dissent. As we have pointed out in previous documents, genuine democracy is anathema to capitalist rule (and vice versa) and as the systemic crisis deepens and the class struggle correspondingly grows in intensity, the ruling class will use every means at its disposal to maintain its hegemony, stripping away even those democratic rights afforded under bourgeois democracy and, as a last resort, imposing fascist rule.While we have not arrived at fascism –the open, terroristic dictatorship of the most reactionary, the most chauvinistic, the most imperialistic elements of finance capitalism – the seeds of fascism have been laid by monopoly capital and its governments, and are beginning to sprout.The only antidote to the dangerous drift to state authoritarianism or fascism is the mobilization of all the pro-democratic forces, anchored by a strong, united, conscious and militant movement of labour and its closest allies, and with a strong and influential presence of the Communists...
By Johan Boyden and Drew Garvie Rebel Youth, Issue 10, Summer-Fall 2010
In the context of the continuing debate about strategy and tactics in the Canadian youth and student movement, activists and organizations need to ask “what kind of youth movement are we building?"
We have now had several months to reflect on the events that unfolded when the G20 occupied Toronto, and also last winter’s 2010 Olympic demos in Vancouver.These events continue to be discussed within the youth and student movement, across English-speaking Canada and Quebec. The debate occurs at a time when there is a widespread critique of diversity of tactics post-G20.
Many are asking: what are other more effective, united and militant alternatives?
For the thousands that participated in the marches, the victims of arrest, and the many at home, the G20 police riot exposed the brutal and dirty methods of Capital. It demonstrated the shallowness and ugly underbelly of bourgeois “democracy.”As the Canadian Civil Liberties Association has said, the police response was “unprecedented, disproportionate and, [even] unconstitutional.”
Why were such brutal means used?The answer can only be intimidation. The ruling class thought they could get away with a more aggressive approach.
But whether Harper and his thugs in blue “won-out” that weekend remains to be seen. Many people still face charges. A movement united around a call for an inquiry is still battling it out with the police’s PR machine. And if events leading up to the G8 and G20 demonstrations are an indicator, there is reason to believe that Harper’s intimidation and attempt at criminalizing dissent will not have its desired effects.
Months prior to the G20 visit, the corporate media and the “Integrated Security Unit” (headed up by the RCMP) tried to desperately intimidate potential protesters.This included tough talk about the “fence”, “protest zones”, new weapons such as the sound cannon, warnings that parents should keep their kids at home, and continual talk about the largest police/military presence assembled on Canadian soil.The security budget scandalized the public when it was announced to be over $1 billion dollars (approx. 7 times that of Pittsburgh’s G20 security costs last year).
The message was clear: “if you don’t want trouble, stay home.”Despite the scare-tactics, almost 40 000 people turned up to protest against the G20.These were the biggest protests in Toronto in many years, and importantly, the largest in Ontario since the economic crisis.
2. “People First”
The week was characterized by lively, creative and democratic resistance. Marches raised many demands: Indigenous sovereignty, climate justice, (im)migrant justice, LGBITQ rights, women’s rights, labour movement struggles like anti-scab legislation, and student’s issues such as accessible education. For example, the Canadian Federation of Students outreached on an international level to the Asian, All-African, Latin American and Caribbean, General Union of Arab, European and United States’ Students organizations, who together issued a joint statement condemning the G20.
The main march took place under the broad “people first” slogan against the Harper Conservative’s pro-corporate attack of working families during the economic crisis. The crowds on the streets also showed that the youth and students’ movement overwhelmingly chose the people’s side of the barricades. The demonstrations became a flashpoint, highlighting the glaring problems of corporate power and capitalism.
Most demonstrators were able to participate from start to finish united, without any incident or attacks. This democratic right and necessity to protest should have been enjoyed by all demonstrators. However in the last few days peaceful protesters as well as journalists, legal observers, and by-standers who had no involvement in the protests, were subjected to a police riot.
3. Saving capitalism
These events happened outside “the fence.”But without drawing the connection to what was happening inside the “G20 perimeter” we are left with an incomplete picture.
This set of G summits was particularly important because global capitalism continues to be mired in a profound economic and structural crisis, notwithstanding the soothing media reports that the ‘worst is behind us’ and that recovery is well under way.
In reality, there is no recovery for most working people. Unemployment and job insecurity remain high, with over 1.5 million out of work. Soon EI benefits will be running out for hundreds of thousands of these unemployed workers. Nor is there any recovery for young workers suffering 14.6% unemployment, for women still earning unequal pay, for students trying to finish their education, for Aboriginal peoples facing systemic joblessness and grinding poverty, for new immigrants and their families trying to build a better life, or for pensioners and others on fixed income.
So what kind of recovery is this? It’s a recovery for the profits of the biggest banks and corporations, and for those who own and control them. Saving capitalism and restoring profit margins were the main concerns of the ‘leaders’, rather than solving the burning problems afflicting the world today.
At the Summit itself, Harper and the rest of the world’s leading criminals agreed to halve deficits by 2013. This translates into drastically increasing the burden on working people globally and locally and gutting public services.(Solutions such as corporate profits being taxed more equitably or cutting military spending on wars and occupations are other options, but they are not in the capitalist’s playbook.)
4. Largest mass arrests in Canadian history
By the end of the weekend, over one thousand and ninety people – mainly youths – had been jailed: the largest mass arrest in Canadian history. Protesters, journalists and passer-by’s were subject to illegal searches, illegal detention, police brutality, harassment, sexual assaults, and detention in cells nick-named “Guantanamo North” where civil liberties were systematically violated and detainees had little access to food and water (see our first-hand account in this issue).
“For the first time ever visiting Toronto I felt unsafe speaking French on the street” one young Montreal activists told RY about police targeting Québécois youth and cars with Québec licence plates. Another activist we spoke to said they met people in the cells “scooped right off the street, randomly, who didn’t even know what ‘G20’ meant.”
And in this ominous direction lies a threat – fascism: the open, terrorist dictatorship of the most reactionary sections of the ruling class, no longer cloaked with limited electoral rights and constitutional protections.
5. The role corporate media
This message was not reinforced by the corporate media, however, which largely ignored the massive peaceful protests. Instead, the news decided to focus on the small-scale property destruction that took place at the G20.
It is mistaken to think that the people’s movement scored a significant victory by attacking the attention of the big business media, which reported on the burning police cars because of the magnitude of that event. Rather, they chose to intensively cover that issue, just as they ignore other protests.To put things in perspective, the amount of G20 “property damage” was comparable to the sixteen police cruisers and numerous buildings damaged in Montreal’s 2008 hockey riot when the Habs eliminated the Bruins. (Less than twenty people were arrested.)
6. The real criminals
However, the main argument used to justify the police riot continues to be that a “Black Bloc” riot precipitated it. “Criminal elements were mixed in with the peaceful protestors.” Five police cars were allowed to burn for hours in front of TV crews. After the G20 the newspapers published front-page photos of the police’s “G20 most wanted list” featuring young people. There is overwhelming evidence, however, that police allowed a small group of protesters a free-hand in engaging in petty property destruction.
As journalist and film director Paul Jay said: “At some point over the weekend the Operational Commander of the Integrated Security Unit watched the action unfold and made two fateful decisions [...] not to immediately move some of the thousands of available police officers into position to stop a hundred or so people from breaking store windows [... and then] to order the arrests of around nine hundred peaceful protestors.” (see “Who Commanded the G20 Commander?” on YouTube).
The police ‘riot’ and the mass arrests did not come about spontaneously, or result from the overzealous behaviour of individual officers. They were carefully worked out well in advance, provided with legal ‘cover’ by Ontario premier Dalton McGinty’s secretive Order-in-Council measure, and vetted by the Office of Prime Minister Stephen Harper. All three – Harper, McGinty and Toronto Police Chief Blair – are culpable for this ‘reign of terror’ on the streets of Toronto.
It's time for the Prime Minister to take responsibility for the G20 fiasco.
Paul Jay
A room filled with police officers stare at pulsing screens; feeds from 85 cameras cover most of Toronto's downtown core. This was the command centre for the G20 Integrated Security Unit (there was another ISU command centre in Barrie). In charge was the RCMP Chief Supt. Alphonse MacNeil.
Command centre for the G20 Integrated Security Unit.
It may have been Toronto police on the streets, but the Feds ran the show. It had been that way from the start. It was the Prime Minister that insisted, over Toronto's objections, on holding the G20 at the Convention Centre. It was the ISU that wanted the Public Works Protection Act. [Toronto Police chief Bill] Blair is wearing it, but operational command was MacNeil's.
At some point over the weekend the Operational Commander of the Integrated Security Unit watched the action unfold and made two fateful decisions. The first was not to immediately move some of the thousands of available police officers into position to stop a hundred or so people from breaking store windows. More importantly, not to quickly stop the trashing of several police cars.
CSIS had decided there was no credible terrorism threat. The whole rationale for all the security was that a small segment of protesters would cause some property damage and might try to storm the security fence. Yet when the windows broke and police cars burned, for perhaps as long as an hour there were no police in sight.
Watch the CP24 coverage of police cars on fire Saturday night on Queen Street. The journalists ask over and over again, where are the police? One says the police were here and then they left, leaving the cars to be torn apart and torched. Read the Toronto Sun reports on embarrassed police who say they were told to stand down.
MacNeil told his hometown paper, the Cape Breton Post:
“'We have the ability through our video feed to see everything that is going on'”
“...there are even helicopters and planes providing video feed.”
“'We can see them from the air, we can see them from the ground, if there is anyone trying to interfere, we would see that.'”
We know the police had infiltrated the Black Bloc, we know they had cameras that could see “everywhere,” so why couldn't they defend their own vehicles? Was this part of a plan or a “lack of available resources” as we have been told? Only a public inquiry can answer the question.
Television images of police cars ablaze set the stage for mass arrests.
The decision to order the arrests of around nine hundred peaceful protestors was the second major decision by the Operational Commander. It was clear to everyone who watched the television coverage (never mind the police cameras), that the actions against property were isolated incidents and did not involve the vast majority of protesters and onlookers.
What was the reason for such a blanket attack on the freedom of assembly, one of the Charter's fundamental rights?
Not only were there mass arrests, but the culture of brutality exhibited by police was extraordinary, given they knew that every move was being watched and taped by their command.
Who ran the training programs that led up to the weekend and created such a sense of impunity?
Who decided that journalists were fair game? Journalists were punched, shoved, arrested, and told they would be arrested if they didn't clear the scene. Having G20 press accreditation was no protection.
What meaningful right to a free press will there be if journalists can't report on how the state exercises its authority? If the government is going to have a legal monopoly on the use of violence, then the public must have the ability – and for this they rely on journalists – to witness, investigate and report on how the machinery of coercion is wielded. There is nothing more important in maintaining some level of democracy.
A month before the G20 I wrote a commentary that said this:
“Is it possible at a time when Canada's government debt is reaching European levels – and we are sure to hear another round of 'deficit mania' that the banker's political and 'journalistic' representatives are fanning from Athens to Washington – that a massive investment in Canada's police force would be a hard sell?”
So, we get back to the one billion dollars (ok, to be exact according to the PBO it's $929,986,110). If Toronto police spent $122-million (that included their own men and all the city police who travelled from across Canada, airfare, hotels and overtime), and the OPP bill for the G8 in Huntsville was around $35-million, how much of the remaining $840-million or so was actually for the G8/G20 weekend?
National Defence got $77-million and CSIS $3-million, but the Mounties received the lion's share – at least $500-million. They did have to guard the foreign guests, deal with the major meeting sites in Huntsville and Toronto, and coordinate the overall security. But given how much more this is than the cost of thousands of men paid out of Toronto's much smaller budget, it's hard to fathom that this was mostly manpower cost.
Kevin Page, the Parliamentary Budget Officer, in a report roughly breaking down the costs says, “It is still unclear how the RCMP will spend its sizeable share of incremental costs.” So, where did the money go? It's just way too much security for a city that has a history of peaceful protest. So what's it really all about?
One is forced to wonder if a hidden agenda of the government was to build the RCMP's technical and surveillance capacity. Are they preparing for the kind of social unrest that might develop in the future if Canada is serious about meeting its G20 pledge of halving its deficit by 2013 – at a time when the world seems heading back into recession? Do our security forces look at the rising tide of strikes and protests in Europe and decide to get ready here?
Ok, a lot of questions and speculation, but some of it is easy to answer with a full and unrestricted report from the Auditor General.
But here's the big one, in terms of accountability, and only a public inquiry with the powers of subpoena will get at this.
Who gave Supt. Alphonse MacNeil his marching orders? Who gave him the green light to violate the Canadian Charter of Rights? Who wanted the Public Works Protection Act? Imposed on the Convention Centre and covertly served up by the Ontario government, it was a test of what civil rights lawyers are calling a form of martial law.
It's not too many degrees of separation to get to the real man in charge – The Prime Minister. This was his show from the start.
Should not Mr. Harper step forward and straightforwardly defend his decisions? If he thinks Canadians should be willing to support and pay for a massive investment in more policing aimed at domestic dissent, and be willing to compromise basic charter rights in the process, then say so. Let's have a proper public debate about it.
And for that matter, shouldn't Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty join him? He went along with the imposition of the archaic 1939 PWPA meant to stop German agents from attacking public buildings.
Only a public inquiry, with subpoena power, led by a person of courage can really get to the bottom of this. But that’s not likely to happen, unless dear readers, you raise your voices and demand it so. [Ed. see July 10 rally on events page.]
Note #1: The Toronto Police Services Board said Tuesday they would create an independent review into police conduct during last month's G20 summit. It will not have subpoena power. Much will depend on who the Reviewer is. If it's someone with guts and wide respect, it could make a contribution.
Note #2: The Canadian Civil Liberties Association has a petition going in support of:
An independent inquiry into the actions of the police during the G20, including: The dispersal of protestors at the designated demonstration site in Queen's Park late afternoon, Saturday June 26th; The detention and mass arrest on the Esplanade on the night of Saturday, June 26th; The arrests and police actions outside the Eastern Ave. detention centre on the morning of Sunday, June 27th; The prolonged detention and mass arrest of individuals at Queen St. W. and Spadina Ave. on the evening of Sunday, June 27th; The conditions of detention at the Eastern Ave. detention centre; Repeal or amendment of the Public Works Protection Act to meet basic constitutional standards; and Law reform to ensure that the Criminal Code provisions relating to “breach of the peace,” “unlawful assemblies” and “riots” are brought in line with constitutional standards.
Paul Jay is the CEO and Senior Editor of The Real News Network. He is an award-winning filmmaker, founder of Hot Docs! International Film Festival and was for ten years the Executive Producer of the CBC Newsworld show counterSpin.
How else can we interpret the G20 communiqué that includes not even a measly tax on financial transactions?
Naomi Klein
Toronto — From Monday's Globe and Mail
My city feels like a crime scene and the criminals are all melting into the night, fleeing the scene. No, I’m nottalking about the kids in black who smashed windows and burned cop cars on Saturday.
I’m talking about the heads of state who, on Sunday night, smashed social safety nets and burned good jobs inthe middle of a recession. Faced with the effects of a crisis created by the world’s wealthiest and most privilegedstrata, they decided to stick the poorest and most vulnerable people in their countries with the bill.
How else can we interpret the G20’s final communiqué, which includes not even a measly tax on banks orfinancial transactions, yet instructs governments to slash their deficits in half by 2013. This is a huge andshocking cut, and we should be very clear who will pay the price: students who will see their public educationsfurther deteriorate as their fees go up; pensioners who will lose hard-earned benefits; public-sector workerswhose jobs will be eliminated. And the list goes on. These types of cuts have already begun in many G20countries including Canada, and they are about to get a lot worse.
They are happening for a simple reason. When the G20 met in London in 2009, at the height of the financialcrisis, the leaders failed to band together to regulate the financial sector so that this type of crisis would neverhappen again. All we got was empty rhetoric, and an agreement to put trillions of dollars in public monies onthe table to shore up the banks around the world. Meanwhile the U.S. government did little to keep people intheir homes and jobs, so in addition to hemorrhaging public money to save the banks, the tax base collapsed,creating an entirely predictable debt and deficit crisis.
At this weekend’s summit, Prime Minister Stephen Harper convinced his fellow leaders that it simply wouldn’tbe fair to punish those banks that behaved well and did not create the crisis (despite the fact that Canada’shighly protected banks are consistently profitable and could easily absorb a tax). Yet somehow these leaders had no such concerns about fairness when they decided to punish blameless individuals for a crisis created by derivative traders and absentee regulators.
Last week, The Globe and Mail published a fascinating article about the origins of the G20. It turns out the entire concept was conceived in a meeting back in 1999 between then finance minister Paul Martin and his U.S.counterpart Lawrence Summers (itself interesting since Mr. Summers was at that time playing a central role in creating the conditions for this financial crisis – allowing a wave of bank consolidation and refusing to regulate derivatives).
The two men wanted to expand the G7, but only to countries they considered strategic and safe. They needed tomake a list but apparently they didn’t have paper handy. So, according to reporters John Ibbitson and TaraPerkins, “the two men grabbed a brown manila envelope, put it on the table between them, and began sketchingthe framework of a new world order.” Thus was born the G20.
The story is a good reminder that history is shaped by human decisions, not natural laws. Mr. Summers and Mr.Martin changed the world with the decisions they scrawled on the back of that envelope. But there is nothing tosay that citizens of G20 countries need to take orders from this hand-picked club.Already, workers, pensioners and students have taken to the streets against austerity measures in Italy,Germany, France, Spain and Greece, often marching under the slogan: “We won’t pay for your crisis.”
And they have plenty of suggestions for how to raise revenues to meet their respective budget shortfalls.
Many are calling for a financial transaction tax that would slow down hot money and raise new money for social programs and climate change. Others are calling for steep taxes on polluters that would underwrite the cost of dealing with the effects of climate change and moving away from fossil fuels. And ending losing wars is always a good cost-saver.
The G20 is an ad hoc institution with none of the legitimacy of the United Nations. Since it just tried to stick us with a huge bill for a crisis most of us had no hand in creating, I say we take a cue from Mr. Martin and Mr.Summers.
Flip it over, and write on the back of the envelope: Return to sender.
Naomi Klein is the author of The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism
RY will be featuring a series of first-hand reports from the G8-G20 protests.
Events witnessed between 12:35-1:45 June 27th 2010 at the corners of Elizabeth and Dundas by the Bay Street Bus Terminal.
By Kate Garvie - Graduate of Environmental Science and International Development Studies at Trent University and member of the Sierra Youth Coalition.
While walking to the Bus terminal to leave Toronto I saw a man being thrown to the ground and hit by 4 police officers with several other officers present. Another citizen was being pushed into the street by an officer. The man was clearly upset that his friend was being assaulted by the police so I stopped to speak with him to see if I could help.
According to this man he and his friend had been walking down the street after eating lunch. (They were attending a conference connected to their PhD research as far as I understood.) They saw a man being pushed around and searched by police across the road and the man's friend had gone across the road to ask if they were inside the security perimeter and if they man was in trouble because as far as they could tell he was getting in trouble for just taking pictures.
As soon as the man asked if they were inside the security perimeter he was thrown against the wall of a restaurant. he tried to pull away and four officers jumped on him. This is when I started watching. The man was handcuffed with a plastic zip tie and was kept lying on the ground for several minutes. He appeared to have injuries on his knees and head. A police officer kept his foot on his back with significant pressure even though he wasn't resisting.
When an officer saw us across the street he came over and asked if we knew the man being arrested. The friend explained that they were just staying in Toronto for a conference. When I asked the police officer what had happened he started yelling in my face "What's in your purse? What's in your purse?" and made me open it. He then said that "This is never going to happen again in this city." I told him that this man appeared to have nothing to do with the protests, peaceful or otherwise. He replied "you're all responsible for this."
A man then came across the road and asked us if we knew the man being arrested. He had been sitting inside the restaurant when the assault took place and had taken pictures of the man on the ground surrounded by police. He had his camera taken and the pictures were erased. When he protested the police response was "this is a whole new world today."
Another officer then came over and started telling us that the man was being charged with assault and resisting his arrest. He would spend the night in prison and maybe get bail. He couldn't promise this though because "Harper is pissed." He then went on to say that we were dressed just like the black bloc. The man who had been arrested was wearing a polo t-shirt and cargo shorts. I was wearing jeans, and a green t-shirt. He then said like the other officer that "this would never happen again in Toronto." When we said we had nothing to do with the black bloc he said that the terrorists were in the sewers and were going to contaminate our water system and we would all die. He also said that yesterday during the protests on Saturday that they had no idea what people were doing behind the big banners and people could have been heating up super glue to produce cyanide and killed everyone.
They then took away three people in a police van. The second police officer came back over and said that they were going to take him to a holding centre and not to worry because they weren't going to "beat the crap out of him." He then told all of us to leave or we would be searched. Right when he was telling me that if we didn't leave I would be searched another officer started yelling "down run from me" and I saw two girls who had been walking away stop and wait for four to six police officers to come over and ask to see their bags. The police proceeded to open all of their bags, take everything out. They appeared to turn on their computer and go through pictures on a camera. One girl was put in hand cuffs. She was just standing talking with them. they were detained for about twenty minutes. I recognized her from peaceful protests the previous day so I stayed to make sure she was alright. The eventually released her and she left with her friend.
During the hour that I was on the corner of Elizabeth and Dundas I saw three people arrested, 5 people searched and 1 person beaten by police. Several people were yelled at for taking pictures and had pictures deleted from their cameras.
For more information about this eye witness account contact Gtwentyresponse@hotmail.com
The World Federation of Democratic Youth joins the international and cross-Canada condemnation of the recent G8-G20 meetings, and the sinister agenda of these imperialist, billion-dollar extravaganzas.
The WFDY calls upon the Canadian government and appropriate local authorities to immediately and unconditionally release all those arrested, drop all charges, and for a full, independent public inquiry into the events.The G-summits, which have placed the city of Toronto under siege with billion-dollar security, will deliver further austerity measures against the workers, the youth and the people in the name of ‘balanced budgets.’ However, was not the youth or the workers who created the economic crisis but rather the imperialists themselves. We ask the governments and world leaders — what should the billions of youth and students, women, aboriginal people and workers’ families should do, when they will not be able to pay the bills, fees, taxes, when they will not be able buy the necessary food for their families. What will the government do, will it send them all to prison?
Unrepresented in the corporate media, the majority of the demonstrations were peaceful. The week was characterized by lively, creative and democratic resistance, culminating in a mass rally of 25 to 30 thousand. However, we condemn the ‘police riot’ and repression tactics used at the protests such as use of police agents, political police or intelligence forces, deliberate provocation, tear gas and rubber bullets, and the historic violent arrest and detention under bad conditions of over 1,000 of demonstrators — including youth activists, random bystanders, and Québécois.
This police repression was not random but no doubt orchestrated in advance by all levels of the Canadian state. The goal was clearly to intimidate dissent and divert public attention from the real issues of the G-summits. However, youth should take heart for the economic crisis which also shows imperialism’s weakness. As long as the problems of imperialism remain unsolved — war, unemployment, genocide, misery, environmental injustice and climate change, oppression of women, racism, hunger, and other scourges — there will be resistance. We call on all the young people to grasp the depth of the global attack against them, and to boldly rally their forces in a united battle. The young people are at the front, united with the workers, of the resistance in Greece and Europe today, in Latin America, and around the world. The power of people’s forces is rising.
The world and mankind don’t need any sort of G’s (G8, G20, etc), but a policy of cooperation and solidarity among all peoples of the world, with no external interferences, guided by an economic model that is in favor of the peoples and not of the dominant classes, in other words, a world free of imperialism!
The young workers’ and students’ global resistance to economic crisis will be a major theme of the 17th World Festival of Youth and Students, to be held in Pretoria, South Africa, this December. At 30,000 young people, it will be the largest anti-imperialist gathering in the world. We welcome all progressive youth and students of Canada, Quebec and Aboriginal Nations to join us at this historic event!
Budapest, July 3rd
WFDY - World Federation of Democratic Youth
Fédération Mondiale de la Jeunesse Démocratique
Federación Mundial de la Juventud Democrática
WFDY is an International NGO with consultative status with UN (ECOSOC) and operational relation with UNESCO. Peace Messenger award by UN Secretary General in 1987 for solidarity with Palestine.
Young Communist League of Canada Statement on the G20 Demonstrations and Police Riots
On the weekend of June 26-27, 2010, the leaders of the top 20 capitalist economies met to devise an agenda for the interests of “private demand” (i.e. the very rich and major transnational corporations) including halving deficits by 2013. This translates into increasing the burden on, and cutting public services to, working people -- since neither will corporate profits be taxed more, nor will the military spending on wars be cut.
Over 30,000 people from across Canada (particularly from Quebec and Southern Ontario) and the world -- involved in the labour, womens', aboriginal, youth and student, migrant, environmental, international solidarity, socialist, and many other movements -- peacefully demonstrated against this criminal agenda. Most were able to participate from start to finish united, without any incident or attacks.
This democratic right and necessity to protest should have been enjoyed by all demonstrators. However in the last few days peaceful protesters as well as journalists, legal observers, and by-standers who had no involvement in the protests have been subjected to a police riot.
The mainstream media has endlessly played images of isolated incidences of mayhem, where the police were absent, occurring not because of insufficient security budgets but in spite of the $1 billion that should have gone for education, health care, and public services at a time when many are suffering from the economic crisis that is not over.
Police had refused to provide assurances that they would not use provocateurs, despite being pressed on this point by Ontario Federation of Labour President Sid Ryan after such agents had been exposed in the 2007 demonstrations in Quebec against the so-called Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP).
What has been ignored is not only the main peaceful demonstration organized by the Canadian Labour Congress and Ontario Federation of Labour, but also the orgy of police violence with rubber bullets, indiscriminate mass arrests, acts of physical assault and intimidation, and night-time arrests of people simply sleeping in student residences.
Even corporate media personalities such as Steve Paikin have tweeted that the police assaults were more frightening than war zone reporting from “Bosnia, Serbia, Croatia, Lebanon, and Israel (Palestine)”. Youth and students, Québécois, as well as people of colour are being disproportionately targeted and need our support at this crucial time.
The Young Communist League stands in solidarity with and calls for on-going mobilizations against the G20 agenda and to support the rights of those who continue to be subjected to police harassment.
We support the Communist Party of Canada’s call for an full and independent inquiry into the police repression and the development of these operations by the Harper Tories, McGinty Liberals and Toronto police chief Blair.
The unleashing of the police on protesters and by-standards alike is an attack on our democratic rights, an attempt to demobilize us while we continue to be robbed by the G20's capitalist agenda.
Witness statements show that it is sufficient just to be young to be arrested and beaten, regardless of having no connection to the demonstrations. Baseless arrests have occurred not just in Toronto but as far as Vancouver. We demand an immediate end to police violence and a full public inquiry into police brutality, infringement on our human rights and where these repressive orders came from.
For many youth this is a time of new and renewed radicalization which demands leadership that will challenge the capitalist ruling class's assaults with a movement for socialism.
In the above article includes reports of physical sexual harassment, money stolen from prisoners by officers, diabetic shock and coma, kidney problems and hypothermia*, loss of artificial leg. Homosexuals were singled out for special harassment. "One fully-uniformed TTC streetcar driver was arrested for hours. He had been ordered out of his streetcar by riot police and was immediately arrested" link here
According to the lastest reports, After no warning was given (no reading of the riot act) blanket arrests of all at Toronto's Queen Street and Spadina was carried out. With police wildly swinging clubs and causing a stampede which resulted in the trampling of people. Injuries were extensive. More details are sure to come out in the coming days.
Police using secret intelligence to pick up key activists as a preventative pre-crime measure have been widely reported in the mainstream media as well as on the Toronto Media Co-op website. Such reports eerily sound like a plot out of Philip K. Dick's short story Minority Report.
Journalists have been routinely attacked. In addition to the usual targets of independent media reporters, a CTV producer was snatched. As reported on toronto media coop, and the Dominion, A reporter from the Manchester Guardian was " held by two cops while a third punched him in the stomach because he 'talked too much', then drove his elbow into the collapsed journalist's back." Four reporters, two from Reuters, and two from the National Post were arrested.
CCLA observers detained refused contacts
Mark Donald and Jon Pipitone, two observers with the Canadian Civil Liberties Association were arrested and has not yet had contact with lawyers to date. The CCLA had about 60 observers on the streets.
Innocent bystander has police sneak into house, wakes up with gun barrel in face
As reported in the Dominion, Toronto Media Co-op and the Toronto Star, Veterinarian John Booth awoke to find cops with their gun sights beaded on his head. Hanna Booth Awoke to find men entering her six month old baby's room. "...Not ringing the doorbell — they’re in my room. I’m in my panties and a tank top, my kid’s screaming his head off, he’s so scared, the tension in the house — it was just the most horrible and absurd thing."
press release by Toronto Community Mobilization Network
June 26, 2010
For Immediate Release:
Press Release At least 4 community organizers currently being held as political prisoners as G20 related police repression continues to increase.
As the G20 meetings happen behind fortified fences, numerous long-time community organizers working on issues ranging from migrant justice to climate change to indigenous sovereignty are being targeted and arrested by police.
At approximately 4:45 a.m., June 26, about 20 police officers raided a Toronto home. They entered the house without consent through the back door, aggressively dragging unclothed people from their beds, kicking others who were asleep on the floor.
Police demanded that everyone provide names and identification. A number of people repeatedly requested to view the warrant before complying with police demands.
“I requested a warrant at least five times from the cop who refused to show me his badge number, to which he said they have every legal right to do what they’re doing and they didn’t have to show us anything,” said Tammy Kovich, a resident of the raided house.
Police forcibly detained and cuffed a number of people, and refused to allow those in the house to call for legal advice. Without showing warrants, asking consent, or giving notice, police did an illegal cursory search of some of the people on the premises as well as the house itself.
“I went out the front door to get a signal so that I could call for legal advice, and a cop grabbed me and pushed me back towards the house. A minute later, I was on the phone with the G20 legal people, and he grabbed my phone away from me and smashed it onto the front porch,” stated another resident, Renee Henderson.
One arrest was made at this house: an organizer of G20 Childcare as well as other community projects. A warrant was not shown for their arrest. This individual was also detained and harassed by police earlier this week while walking on in Toronto, and was searched without credible legal rationale.
Across town, the door to another house was kicked in and three long time community organizers Leah Henderson, Alex Hundert and Mandy Hiscocks were placed under arrest. Warrants have also been issued for the arrest of other community organizers. These politically motivated raids and arrests of community members are just some of the tactics the police have been using to intimidate and silence those who have voiced their concern about the illegitimate and undemocratic institutions of the G8/G20.
Issued by the Central Executive Committee, Communist Party of Canada, June 2010
On the eve of the G8/G20 meetings, mass labour and democratic mobilizations are building in Southern Ontario and across Canada to protest this wasteful, security-obsessed extravaganza. The Communist Party of Canada salutes this resistance and takes its rightful place alongside workers, students, women, Aboriginal peoples and social activists in denouncing these summits which aim to hammer out a strategic line among the ruling imperialist states and international finance capital on how best to advance their shared interests, and then present their agenda as a fait accompli to the world's peoples.
This set of G-summits is particularly important because global capitalism continues to be mired in a profound economic and structural crisis, notwithstanding the soothing media reports that the 'worst is behind us' and that recovery is well under way. Saving capitalism and restoring profit margins are the main concerns of these 'leaders', rather than solving the burning problems afflicting the world today. That is why issues like climate change, the world food crisis, ending wars of occupation and rampaging military spending, and the worsening problem of "under-development", especially in Africa, have all be swept off the agenda of the G8/G20 meetings.
Bank of Canada governor Mark Carney admitted as much this June when he declared that the Summits must focus attention on the continuing crisis, especially in Europe, which has had a serious "impact on financial conditions ... [and] it's not over." He then parroted the World Bank which earlier raised the possibility of a "second recession affecting most of the industrialized world if governments don't deal successfully with the unfolding European debt crisis."
In fact, the leading imperialist countries, including Canada, want to use the Summits to showcase their determination to impose further social and economic austerity on all states and peoples, as the only viable solution to overcome the crisis. But this is a false 'international consensus" - one that serves the interests of finance capital, but which consigns the vast majority of the world's working class and oppressed peoples to even more hardship and suffering.
In Europe, the Austerity agenda pushed by the European Union brass and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) is already having a devastating effect, especially on public sector workers, youth, and pensioners. Minimum wages are being slashed, social programs cut, and the retirement age extended for workers.
But this savage attack is being met by heroic resistance across the European continent, especially in Greece and Portugal where the left, Communist-led unions and popular movements are mounting escalating general strikes and other forms of mass resistance to fightback against this anti-social onslaught of Big Capital and its governments.
In Canada, we need to replicate the kind of militancy building in Europe, Latin America and elsewhere around the world. The right-wing Harper government and their pro-corporate provincial counterparts (both Conservative and Liberal) are also moving to deepen the assault on workers' conditions, social programs, and democratic and equity rights. And they will succeed in pushing through these reactionary 'reforms', unless the labour and people's forces move quickly to mount a militant, coordinated, Canada-wide counter-attack.
This is such a progressive alternative to this reactionary, pro-capitalist 'solution',, but it must go beyond, palliative demands to soften the impact. It must include sweeping measures which challenge the dominance of monopoly capital, such as the nationalization of the banks, the big energy monopolies, and other key sectors of our economy. These steps need to be combined with social measures like expanding access to healthcare, public and post-secondary education, raising the minimum wage to $16/hour, reducing the workweek with no loss in take-home pay, and improving public pensions. And with sweeping tax reform which would shift the burden from working people onto the corporations and the wealthy, and with an immediate withdrawal from the disastrous war of occupation in Afghanistan, along with a 50% cut in military spending which would save another $10 billion every year.
As we state in our May Day 2010 statement, "the big monopolies and banks want to make working people pay for the economic recovery through lower wages, higher unemployment, and huge cuts in social spending. We say: those who reap billions in profits must pay! Unite and fight for a fundamentally new direction, placing the needs of working people and our environment before corporate greed, [and for policies] based on peace and disarmament!"
