G20 protests in Hamburg: Police attacks peaceful protesters
After police already tried to make it impossible for protesters to sleep, washed away people just because a place was crowded and generally make any protest has hard as possible, they seem to take every possibility now to scare people away.
Yesterday at the "Welcome to Hell" protest march the peaceful situation escalated.
Who was at fault? The police had warned for weeks that thousands of violent protester, especially in the "Black Block" are coming to Hamburg.
And there were Black Block people at the "Welcome to Hell" demo. They entered the already marching protest. They were masked. (In Germany it normally is forbidden to be masked at a demo.)
The situation, according to several reporters and members of the town parliament, was as follows:
The protest on one side, hundreds of police in the way. Discussion about de-masking. The Black Block agreed and began demasking. Music is playing in the background.
Then a drunken man throws one single beer bottle. (Try to have ten thousand people in one place without a thrown beer bottle, it is impossible ;) )
So far so normal (except maybe the de-masking). Not a reason to attack. But police did attack, marched into the protest march and used pepper spray.
And once you use pepper spray in a mass of people, you have running, panic and someone kicking back.
This provocative behavior of the police is known as "Hamburger Linie", and the responsible police officer Hartmut Dudde has been judged to break the law several times (German video) in the past with that. (And several police members have protested against this, too.)
Contrary to that Hamburger Linie the protests so far have been incredibly peaceful compared to similar big events.
You can see the escalation yourself i n the recorded live stream following minute 58:00 here.
https://www.facebook.com/telesurenglish/videos/1136435953166472/?permPage=1
Police on Twitter reported they were attacked by "massive attack with bottles and items". I was not able to see that - before the pepper spray.
Assortment of links to German media
EDIT: Later in the evening and in the early night both peaceful protest and violent fights happened. One action was to rain down fake money on police. Fire fighters were called 70 times, mostly for small fires on the street like burning trash cans, but a few cars were set to fire, too.
EDIT 2: "law blog" Udo Vetter about the incident (in German): dagger stab for the constitution
I attended the scene yesterday and there was agressive potential from the crowd as well. The "black block" even marched in like soldiers. (you can see them at the start of the video below.)
Sounds for me like Italian? Right at the start??? I am really bad at voices in videos :(
And they marched in like soldiers like the police ;) It always looks so if you march.
I could not see anyone starting from your perspective (Maybe I just didn't catch the scene?)
What I can see is that people are making the place free and when this is nearly finished, the water cannon starts shooting at the last people at 5:44.
And then of course things get thrown back. The BB waited for the police to attack I think.
You can also see the stress reaction from the bystanders, very interesting from psychological point.
Yeah it is an Italian slogan but also used for German leftist
Siamo Tutti Antifascisti = We are all antifascists.
As I told you, nobody knows for sure who struck first, but if people cheer and give the way for the black block means they accept violence and agression from this side.
You can see a violent aftermath randomly directed to citizens of Hamburg, definitely not triggered by police as it happened todays morning.
https://steemit.com/politics/@lennstar/burning-cars-in-hamburg
https://steemit.com/steemit/@flauschi/hamburg-hamburg-hamburg-hamburg-hamburg-hamburg-hamburg-hamburg-hamburg-hamburg-hamburg
Some crazy stuff are going on in Hamburg now. I believe Herr Dudde is just not a fan of large demonstration, so he uses his position to "calm down the city" so to say.
In general this G20 summit is more interesting than they usually are. My eyes are on the upcoming Trump and Putin meeting, will be very interesting to see what both of the presidents will have to say about it after it ends.
How can you call the protestor 'peacefull'? Did you even watch some videos or have you seen some pictures?
Yes. And I have seen a lot of peaceful protesters, as have a big number of reporters and members of the Hamburgs Parliament - I have written that, didn't I?
I have also seen some that are not peaceful.
In this reported case there were 12000 peaceful and 1000 maybe violence-ready people and the police on scene.
edit: also you should never forget that there may be undercover police inciting the violence in the black block, especially Hamburg has a history in that.