Associated Press | By RACHEL LA CORTE | November 14, 2003
Thousands of protesters are expected to take to the streets of Miami to protest trade talks next week, and while many of them say they will demonstrate peacefully, police are preparing for extremist groups bent on wreaking havoc.
More than 40 federal, state and local law enforcement agencies have spent months training for the possibility of trouble at the Free Trade Area of Americas meeting that starts Sunday and runs through next Friday.
Police have assigned thousands of officers to response teams, staged mock protest encounters, readied fire trucks that could double as water cannons, and plan to construct a security fence around the hotel where the talks will be conducted. Also, the city adopted an ordinance that bans protesters from carrying guns and lumber, among other things.
Trade ministers from 34 countries will discuss creating a free trade zone that would cover all of the Western Hemisphere except Cuba. Many opponents believe free trade agreements mean a loss of American jobs to developing nations, widen the gap between rich and poor, and undermine environmental regulations.
Authorities do not want Miami to become another Seattle, where a World Trade Organization meeting in 1999 ended with little accomplished in trade talks and five days of riots that tarnished that city's image and caused $3 million in damage. The violence resulted in 500 arrests and accusations that police overreacted. Seattle's police chief resigned in the fallout.
"Seattle was a moment of a great victory," said L.A. Kauffman, national mobilizing coordinator for New York-based United for Peace and Justice. "Thousands of people came together to challenge the WTO and talks have never really gotten back on track."
Law enforcement authorities are most concerned about small groups such as the Black Bloc, described as anarchists who dress in black and wear masks and target storefronts of multinational corporations and their franchises.
"When you have a small group that has no other goal than to destroy property or to hurt people or to disrupt an event, that small group could be a serious issue," police spokeswoman Herminia Salas-Jacobson said.
Clashes between protesters and police have become common at trade talks and other meetings promoting globalization. In September, demonstrators in Cancun, Mexico, battled police, hurling rocks and sewage in an effort to break through barricades at WTO talks there.
Hardline activists use increasingly sophisticated tactics, such as wearing gas masks and bulletproof vests. Some use so-called sleeping dragons, devices constructed of PVC pipes or other materials through which people link arms, complicating police efforts to disband them.
As downtown businesses in Miami are bracing for demonstrations, police will close a number of streets and restrict access to areas near the meeting.
Avi Cohen, owner of Seaman's Sound, an electronics store, said he will board up his windows and close for the latter part of the week, when the biggest demonstrations are expected. He and some friends also plan to sleep in the store all week to protect the place.
"I put too much into this store to have somebody burn it down in two minutes," he said.
On the Net:
Official Miami FTAA site: http://www.miamiftaa2003.com
Some opposition sites:
http://stopftaa.org
http://portland.indymedia.org/en/action/ftaa-miami/
http://www.ftaaresistance.orgAssociated Press:
