Newsgroup: it.politica
Titolo: MEMO: Stampa e Tv estere dissero...

By Julie Hyland
15 August 2001
Mounting evidence of police provocations and brutality against
protesters  during the G-8 summit held July 20-22 in Genoa has
provoked growing  international condemnation.
Eyewitness testimony and television footage are providing damning
accounts  of police torture, civil rights abuses and collusion between
police and  right-wing activists. Some 200 people were injured and 301
people were  arrested or detained, including 100 foreign nationals,
during protests  involving up to 100,000 demonstrators outside the G-8
summit. Under Prime  Minister Silvio Berlusconi, Genoa was turned into
a virtual armed fortress,  with sections of the city ringed by a
five-metre-high steel fence and guarded by 20,000 security police.
As world leaders met in the Palazzo Ducale, TV footage from outside
the  proceedings captured the final moments of one unarmed
demonstrator, Carlo  Giuliani, who was shot dead by the Carabinieri
(paramilitary police). 
There  were also unconfirmed reports that a French woman was killed
the same day  at the Ventemiglia border crossing, as police sought to
prevent her and  others from entering the country.
Approximately 49 people remain in jail. Reports have surfaced of 
indiscriminate beatings and scores of detainees having been deprived
of  their right to a lawyer or to contact with family members. Among
those  still imprisoned is Susanna Thomas, an American student who was
observing  the summit as part of her research into how the current
protest movement compares with the Quaker tradition of non-violent
resistance.
The human rights group Amnesty International has launched its own 
investigation into the behaviour of the Italian police. The
organisation has said that the head of its Greek section was among
those assaulted by the Carabinieri. In a separate statement, a group
of lawyers from Milan who  witnessed the events in Genoa have accused
the Italian authorities of riding roughshod over civil liberties. "It
all looked like an attempt to substitute the current order with a
police state," the lawyers declared.
Only six weeks before the summit, Berlusconi's Forza Italia (FI)
entered government in a coalition with the NEO-FASCIST Alleanza
Nazionale (NA-National Alliance) and the separatist Lega Nord
(Northern League). But 
as reports have mounted of police beating and urinating on detained 
protesters, forcing some to shout "Viva Mussolini", even those
governments  supportive of the right-wing coalition have felt obliged
to express  dissatisfaction with the actions of the police.
Pressure has mounted in Spain, Britain and the US for those
governments to  follow the lead of Germany and France and make
official complaints over the  treatment of their nationals. The
Austrian government expressed "outrage"  at the continued detention of
25 people belonging to the VolxTheater-Karawane theatre group.
The Berlusconi government has sought to blame the protesters for the 
violence. These efforts have been undermined by the fact that all but
one of ninety-three people detained in a police raid on a secondary
school used to house protesters and the offices of the Genoa Social
Forum have been cleared of any violence and released without charges.
The accounts of police violence have intensified criticism of the 
government within Italy. Berlusconi's own television station, Canale
5, carried graphic scenes of the secondary school raid, showing
puddles of protesters' blood on hallway floors, and newspapers have
published detailed accounts of human rights abuses.
The daily La Republica carried the disclosures of one anonymous
officer involved in the school raid. According to his account, the
police lined protesters "up against the wall". 
Continuing the account, La Republica writes: "They urinated on one
person. They beat people up if they didn't sing Facetta Nera [a
fascist song]. One girl was vomiting blood, but the 
chief of the squad just looked on. They threatened to rape girls with
their batons." The officer further said that right-wing thugs within
the police had been assured they could brutalise detained protesters
with impunity.
Another police raid, on the offices of the independent media group 
Indymedia, has also become a focus of allegations of civil rights 
abuses. The late night raid, which involved 13 police commanders and
70  officers, saw police vehicles ram the gates of the school that
housed the media centre, where protesters were sleeping. In the
ensuing attack, 90 people were arrested and at least 66 people
injured.
Journalists hid under desks as police stormed through the building,
seizing computers and documents.
Eyewitness accounts report that 30 ambulances were required to treat
the battered protesters, many of whom had to be carried out of the 
building. Dr. Roberto Papparo, head of the emergency department at 
Ospedale San Martino, Genoa's biggest hospital, which treated more
than 50 of those injured in the raid, said, "If these people weren't
brought to the hospital, there is no doubt that some of them wouldn't
be alive."
The brutality continued at the Bolzaneto detention centre, a former 
gymnasium specially prepared for the interrogation of alleged 
"ringleaders". Protesters transferred from the school allege they were
subjected to hours of physical and psychological torture. Prisoners, 
including those with broken limbs, were spread-eagled against a wall
while they were verbally abused and beaten.
The newspaper La Stampa has called for judicial authorities to get to
the bottom of eyewitness accounts that accuse the police of violating
"the rules of a democratic state".
Francisco Martone, a Green Party senator, said that fascists had 
infiltrated the police, whilst Massimo D'Alema, head of the Democratic
Left (the reformed Italian Communist Party), called for the
resignation of Interior Minister Claudio Scajola, who is considered to
be Berlusconi's right-hand man. Scajola and Gianni De Gennaro, Italy's
national police chief, have been at each other's throats, De Gennaro
insisting that his force acted in accordance with the minister's own
instructions, whilst Scajola denies any responsibility.
Berlusconi's suggestion that future summits planned for Italy be moved
elsewhere has provoked opposition from those within the Italian 
establishment who see any such move as a blow to the country's efforts
to play a leading role on the world stage. Romano Prodi, president of
the European Union Commission, warned the prime minister that such a
decision would be "a blow, a real defeat" for his government.
Berlusconi has acquiesced to demands for a series of limited judicial 
inquires into the violence, in exchange for the opposition's pledge to
drop its call for Scajola's resignation. In what was described as an
"ashen faced" and "visibly shaken" address to the Senate, the prime
minister acknowledged the growing international outrage and promised,
"If there were abuses, excesses and violence ... there will be no
cover-up for those who have violated the law."
The convening of six judicial inquiries enabled Scajola to survive a 
no-confidence motion presented August 1 by the opposition, by 180
votes to 106 with 1 abstention. Almost immediately, Scajola ordered
the removal of three top law enforcement officials: Ansoino Andreassi,
the deputy chief of police in charge of the G-8, Arnaldo La Barbera,
head of the anti-terrorism department, and Francesco Colucci, the
police superintendent of Genoa. A statement said they were being moved
to "other posts", but did not specify where.
Later, in a televised statement, Berlusconi urged the opposition to
support his government in a "common front against terror".
The inquiries have a strictly limited remit. It has already been
stated that it will not be possible to identify many of the police
officers involved.
These largely token measures have done little to quell public anger at
the violent actions of the police. They are clearly aimed at political
damage control, acknowledging at most individual "excesses" while
clearing the government itself of any responsibility.
In the first of the parliamentary investigations, National Police
Chief De Gennaro admitted there might have been some "excesses in
using force", but he presented these as the result of individual
errors rather than any conscious plan.
However, the evidence indicates that such a plan was indeed involved,
and leading members of Berlusconi's government are directly
implicated.
Berlusconi and Fini, the deputy prime minister and NEO-FASCIST NA
leader, both visited Genoa in the run-up to the summit. Fini boasted
that he had personally finalised the security plans, even though his
office has no responsibility for policing. In the Senate, opposition
members openly charged Fini whose NA has its origins in the fascist
Movimento Sociale Italiano (MSI)with encouraging his followers in the
police and security forces to "crack heads".
Their charges were backed up by an article in the August 6 issue of
the German news magazine Der Spiegel. Under the headline "VIVA
PINOCHET", the magazine alleged: "On the very Saturday afternoon when
the street battles raged in Genoa, a small group of politicians sat in
Forte San Giuliano, the headquarters of the Carabinieri:
parliamentarians of Alleanza Nazionale led 
by their chairman, Fini."
The close connections between the fascists and the security apparatus
date back to the 1960s, when they collaborated in a terror campaign
aimed at destabilising the Italian state and paving the way for a
coup. The "strategy of tension" included using agents provocateurs and
detonating bombs, causing significant fatalities, which were blamed on
the left.
Many charge that these methods are now being revived. In the weeks
prior to the summit, "anti-globalisation extremists" were blamed for
bombings in Milan, Bologna, Treviso and Genoa. Berlusconi subsequently
claimed to have received death threats.
Attention has particularly focused on the role during the protests of
the "Black Bloc", an ad hoc group of anarchists. It is generally
believed, with good reason, that the Black Bloc were heavily
infiltrated by the state, and essentially functioned under the
direction of the police and security forces to provide a pretext for
the attack on otherwise peaceful demonstrators. "The Black Blocs were
an instrument of the police, it was a 
clear strategy," Luca Casarini, one of the leaders of the Tute Bianche
(White Overalls) group, told the press.
Some 35 of Italy's most talented film directors, led by veteran
director Francesco Maselli, were in Genoa to document the protests.
Several reported witnessing a close working relationship between
police and numerous Black Bloc members. The latter were seen moving
freely in and out of police stations. David Ferrio, one of the
directors in the city to film the events, recorded the image of what
at first appeared to be a protester, handkerchief over his mouth,
moving towards police as if to attack. Later 
Ferrio videoed the same individual, now wearing a police badge, giving
directions to a couple on a moped.
Allegations are also emerging that the Black Bloc were involved in
helping set up the police raid on the school complex that served as
headquarters for the Genoa Social Forum. The Wall Street Journal of
August 9 cited the account of Marta Vincenzi, governor of the Genoa
province. In the article Ms. Vincenzi alleged that 200 to 300 Black
Bloc militants "kicked non-violent demonstrators out of a gym next to
the Martin Luther King High School on the evening of July 19". This
forced some of the demonstrators to move into the Genoa Social Forum
complex, where they were later attacked in the police sweep of the
facility.
------------------------------------------
THE REAL MEANING OF GENOA
By Mumia Abu-Jamal
Column Written 8/1/01
     When one mentions the very name of Genoa these days,
the historical significance of its Columbian roots mixes with
its new-found renown as the site of the G-8 Meeting, and
the state killing of a young, anti-globalist demonstrator,
Carlo Guiliani.
     It is now an historical marker of another kind -- one of
the state's brutality. The images from the tear-gas
streaked streets of the ancient Italian city mark a
transformation in the growing anti-globalist movement.
It marks a new low in the violent savagery of police, who
will go to any lengths to protect those they are sworn
to really protect: the rich, the wealthy and the
established.
     Much less is known or reported about the vicious,
unprovoked attacks on young people who were working
out of the Independent Media Center in Genoa. Squads
of hooded Genoan cops unjustly raided, beat, brutalized
and terrorized independent journalists covering the
massive protests. Some bystanders reported hearing
screams emitting from the building for hours.
     Others on the scene reported that activists were taken
to a room, shown a picture of the late Italian Fascist
dictator, Benito Mussolini, and ordered to shout, "Viva
Il Duce!", at a nearby police station ('Il Duce' was a term
of respect accorded Mussolini during Italy's Fascist,
World War II period, similar to the Nazi honorific,
"Der Fuhrer' for Hitler; 'Viva' means 'Long Live').
     This is a scene that reflects the hidden, FASCIST
heart of Genoa.
     Where were the millionaire star reporters, who
love to gather in 5-star, ritzy hotels to lament what
happens to their brother journalists in the Third
World, or Bosnia? When have you heard a peep
out of the corporate punditocracy about the assaults
on poor, independent or radical journalists who
were at the front lines of Genoa?
     When young activists who were peacefully
assembled to write, to interview, to report, to
prepare and to broadcast what they witnessed
at the Wealthfest (G-8 Summit), their persons
were attacked, their freedoms were shattered,
and their terrorization at the hands of a repressive
state was all but ignored. Their shocking
treatment at the hands of neo-fascist, hooded
cops for capital was simply not news.
     "So sorry," the gentle corporate press sniffs,
"We don't see a story here."
     And, in truth, there is no story, simply because
it is not in the interests of their bosses to do such
a story. That way, they can continue to engage
in useless prattle about 'freedom of the press,' or
the 'right to peaceful assembly,' or even the
'right to dissent' and the like. For, aren't the G-7
(plus Russia) 'industrial democracies'?
     They cannot afford to report what happened
in Genoa, for it tells us too much about what
really happens in democracies.
     The terror, the torture, the brutality, that
lies at the heart of all 'industrial democracies.'
     "Viva Il Duce!", indeed, for great
dictatorships have ever been great bedfellows
of capital.
     The Nazi state worked with a cruel efficiency
that used Jewish, Romani, and other untermenshen
(German for subhumans) as slave labor that
earned healthy profits for the wealthy ruling,
industrial class.
     Genoa, which sent forth the greed of Columbus
to pilfer and colonize and enslave, unleashes her
corporate army upon those who now look unkindly
upon the neo-colonialization, and exploitation
hidden under the rubric of a New World (Economic)
Order.
     The anti-globalist movement, so young, so
precious, spawned just a few moments ago
in Seattle, must now come of age.
     That is the gift of Genoa.
L'Italia deve tacere:governa un gran corruttore,lo sanno tutti,pure l'arb.Moreno

 prevent her and  others from entering the country.
Grande articolo!!
1) Carlo Giuliani era un dimostrante disarmato, abbattuto dai Carabinieri!
2) E' morta una donna a Ventimiglia, uccisa dalla Polizia che non voleva
farla entrare in Italia!!
Se questa è il livello della stampa estera che segui, ti consiglio
"L'abecedario di Mastro Geppetto" in inglese e "Tutti in forma con Jane
Fonda"