I have just left a standoff on a bridge in Prague between police and demonstrators (a bridge fortunately very near a center with free Internet access!) It is 2:20 pm in Prague (8:20 am in the Eastern U.S.), and when I left the demonstrators had not broken through police lines.
But let me back up a few steps. At 9:00 this morning I arrived at Namesti miru, the public square near downtown Prague where the thousands of demonstrators in Prague to oppose the IMF and World Bank on the occasion of their annual general meetings were told to meet. The square was packed with a great variety of groups from a great variety of places, speaking an equally great number of languages. One of the largest contingents was from Greece, marching and singing. The atmosphere was genuinely festive, though not without reminders from the podium of the serious reasons people were gathering.
Among the many groups in the park, among the most visible were a range of environmental and Jubilee 2000 groups and large contingents representing revolutionary and socialist parties from several European countries. There was an anarchist contingent in the part also, but small enough to make me think it was not the whole group.
The march kicked off about 11:15, with three different groups going on different routes towards the Congress Center where the IMF and World Bank are meeting. The avowed intent of the demonstrators is to blockade the delegates inside the meeting, presumably on the theory that if they have to spend enough time with each other they will ultimately give in to the demand to disband the institutions.
The largest group (I think -- it is of course often harder to know what's going on when you're in the middle of something than if you're watching a TV account or reading about it after the fact) went toward the bridge leading to the Congress Center, while the other two went through the valley that the bridge traverses.
Taking the lead going onto the bridge were the Italian groups affiliated with "Ya Basta!," which draws its inspiration from the Zapatistas of Mexico. They wear extensive padding under white body suits and have staged remarkable actions in Italy in which they go through police barriers holding their arms in the air and accepting the blows of the authorities.
Although I could not see very well, there was clearly a skirmish going on between the first line of Ya Basta members and police who had erected a serious barricade on the bridge - a barricade with two tanks (that I could see), maybe 200 cops, and . Now that I am on the internet, I have read that several people have been beaten, both there and at a valley location. I also have reliable information that water cannons are being used in the valley.
The three lines of Ya Basta members and the several hundred behind them, many with gas masks, appeared very determined. At this point, however, it is hard to know if the demonstrators will be able to succeed in breaking through to the meeting site.
There are reports in some of the mainstream media now of acts of violence, said to be initiated by protesters - but I have not witnessed any of these incidents, nor spoken to anyone who has.
BEFORE TODAY
In the lead up to the Prague S26 actions, there have been a variety of forums and meetings and training sessions. Both CEE Bankwatch Network and INPEG, the coalition responsible for organizing most of the protests, have been staging parallel meetings. (I spoke at the INPEG event on Friday about the position of the 50 Years Is Enough Network.) Perhaps my favorite event so far, however, was a press conference yesterday at the INPEG media center at which reporters who came to ask the usual questions about how many people would be demonstrating were confronted with a formidable speaker in Marie Shaba, representing the Tanzania Gender Networking Programme (a 50 Years South Council member). Her eloquent, impassioned descriptions of what (corporate) globalization means for people in Africa provided the necessary background for the 80 or so reporters. They should now know why we are protesting.
TOMORROW
There is a debate scheduled for tomorrow between civil society representatives, including longtime 50 Years friend Dennis Brutus (anti-apartheid activist, poet, and member of Jubilee 2000 South Africa), and IMF and World Bank officials. It should be interesting. In the afternoon we have scheduled a press conference to launch the World Bank Bonds Boycott in Europe.
And of course we'll all be taking stock of everything that has gone on in Prague, and around the world, on S26.
Soren Ambrose 50 Years Is Enough Network