The Battle of Genoa-A First-Hand Account

Organizers of the anti-G8 protest in Genoa say that 200,000 people came from
all over Italy and Europe to join the mammoth demonstration yesterday. In
contrast to Friday, the day seemed to be relatively peaceable...until the
evening. At around 11 pm, while I and several media people were filing
stories, the police barged into the Genoa Social Forum press center in
search of "anarchists."

"Prensa, prensa," we shouted, our hands held high, as baton wielding
carabinieri pushed us and commanded us to sit on the floor. We were captives
for the next hour, but things were worse at the high school next door which
served as temporary quarters for people coming from out of town. About 200
police in full riot gear crashed into the building, rounding up Nazi-style
about twenty young people suspected of being anarchists.

Still things were less chaotic than the day before. I will never forget
Friday.

The police van came careening down the Via Giovanni Tomaso Invrea, moving
crazily from one side of the narrow street to the other in pursuit of
protesters. I flattened myself against the wall, and it missed me by two
feet. Another six inches and it would have mowed down the man in front of
me. "Assassino, assassino," people screamed as the vehicle stopped a few
yards away. A bald carabineri opened the door and glared at us.

Everything happened so quickly. Just twenty-five minutes before, at around
2:15 pm, a column of around 8,000-10,000 people, led by the famed
specialists in civil disobedience the Tute Bianche, were marching down the
Via Tolemaide, with marshalls using megaphones announcing, "This is a
nonviolent march. We believe in nonviolence." The goal of the marchers was
to reach the twenty-foot wall of iron that the authorities had erected
around the Group of Eight meeting site at the Piazza Ducale about two
kilometers away.

They never reached the wall. At the foot of the hill, at the intersection
with Via Corsino, carabineri hidden in a small side street started firing
tear gas in an unprovoked attack that scattered the advance ranks of the
march where there were many reporters and television crews.

The Battle of Genoa had begun.

Throughout the next four hours, the battle unfolded in the narrow
sidestreets and the small piazzas of the Corso Torino area, with the battle
lines shifting constantly. The police would attack with teargas, vans and
armored personnel carriers. The protesters would retreat, then come back
with stones and bricks ripped from the pavement. Huge trash bins were turned
over to serve as barricades. "Genova Libera! Genova Libera!" would erupt
from the crowd everytime the police were forced back.

At 4:20 pm, I had my first glimpse of an injured man being carried away by
the first aid personnel of the Tute Bianche. It was at around the same time
that one person was shot dead by carabineri in the same vicinity. Ambulance
sirens blared constantly. Later I would find out that about 150 people had
been injured during the day--about fifty of them being members of the media.

I also learned later that there were acts of civil disobedience throughout
the day, the most dramatic apparently being that of a woman from the
so-called "Pink Bloc" of marchers who tried to scale the steel wall to place
grappling hooks on it, only to be hosed down brutally by the police when she
had got nearly to the top.

Unfortunately, the anarchists--the so-called "Black Bloc"--were also around.
Despite efforts by mainstream demonstrators to dissuade them with dramatic
pleas for nonviolence, they went about burning a couple of cars, including
an Alfa Romeo. They also moved down Genoa's beautiful seafront drive, the
Corso Italia, selectively breaking windows--breaking those of banks and car
companies while leaving those of restaurants untouched. "Capitalism kills"
with an anarchist logo alongside was painted on walls.

Many protesters were very upset about the antics of the few hundred
anarchists in a global assembly of about 100,000 people. Fabio Bellini, a
25-year-old Genoan, told me: "It is right to demonstrate against the G-8.
It's right to fight for a better world, and that's why I'm here. But I don't
understand the window breaking. I'm sad for Genoa." Pam Foster, the
coordinator of the Halifax Initiative in Canada, asked: "Why did the police
go after peaceful demonstrators but take their time dealing with the
anarchists?"

The antics of the Black Bloc were the subject of many passionate debates
when the protesters streamed back to the convergence center at Piazza
Kennedy at dusk. Observing one of these spontaneous arguments, Han Soeti of
Indymedia-Belgium commented, "There are reports that instead of arresting
anarchists, the police were escorting some of them to critical areas. I
heard the same thing in Prague and Barcelona."

It is, however, for the new Italian Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi, that
the protesters, both Italian and non-Italian, reserve their greatest anger.
During the struggle at the Corso Torino, Gino Pierantoni, another Genoese,
told me, "I don't know where you will find truth in this mess. But I am sure
that a great part of the blame rests with this man, who really is incapable
of leading this country." Berlusconi is regarded as having militarized the
situation, going against the moves of the local government, which tried to
accommodate the protest movement. A retired Italian general who headed the
United Nations peacekeeping force in Beirut in the seventies summed up the
feelings of many Italians when he commented that he did not know why
Berlusconi assigned 20,000 carabineri to Genoa when he only needed 2,500
troops to keep the peace in the whole of Beirut.

As in Seattle, Washington, DC, and Prague, organizers of what has been the
biggest anti-globalization protest so far are worried that the street
battles and the antics of the anarchists might overshadow the message that
they wanted to deliver to the G-8. Over several months, the Genoa Social
Forum was able to line up about 600 groups behind a pledge of non-violence.
It also sponsored a week-long teach-in, involving international speakers,
with topics ranging from "Who Needs Trade Liberalization?" to "Mechanisms
for Global Democracy" to "Alternatives to Globalization." Among those who
delivered talks were anti-globalization gurus Susan George, a critic of
neoliberalism, and José Bové, better known as the man who dismantled a
McDonalds restaurant.

The G-8, however, was deaf to the protests on the streets. While Berlusconi
delivered a carefully crafted statement saying he was "saddened" by the
death of the demonstrator, he also said it was not connected to the G-8. To
add insult to injury, the G-8, on the evening on July 20, issued a statement
in which it encouraged the launching of a new round of trade negotiations in
Quatar. Opposition to a new round and the World Trade Organization was what
had brought thousands of people from all over Europe and the world to Genoa.

arch/ive/ief (2000 - 2005)