Occupy Melbourne: Riot police drag protesters from City Square

[Matilda]

Source: News.com.au

RIOT police have descended on the Occupy Melbourne camp at City Square and begun forcibly removing protesters.

(snip)

Members from the Critical Incident Response Team removed a man from the middle of the protest site shortly after 10am and two others from outside the site after about 100 protesters defied Melbourne City Council's 9am eviction order.

Inspector Mick Beattie said police had enough resources to cope with the eviction of protesters, who continued to defy a Melbourne City Council eviction order.




Read more: http://www.news.com.au/business/occupy-melbourne-riot-police-drag-protesters-from-city-square/story-e6frfm1i-1226172791776

---

Although the Lord Mayor has denied it, the police action may well have a lot to do with the visit of the Queen to Melbourne next week. It might be good for the Queen to see an Occupy movement for herself, instead of all the usual government-run set pieces.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

1. Melbourne downunder

[Matilda]

2. Link to good video footage, as it is happening now.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-10-21/city-square-protestors-ordered-out/3591210

[msongs]

3. time to occupy buckingham palace? hmm nt

[Little Tich]

4. Occupy Melbourne getting turfed: Radio, Pics & twitter at 3aw radio

Source: 3AW radio

UPDATE: Riot police have stormed the Occupy Melbourne camp, arresting protesters at City Square amid dramatic scenes.

At least two people have been arrested with officers begin forcibly removing protesters from the makeshift tent city.

Police in riot gear advanced on the protesters at 11.30am, tearing down the barricade and standing face-to-face with the group, who linked arms and yelled "the whole world is watching!"

Angry scuffles have broken out between the two groups outside the Starbucks coffee shop, with officers carrying out some people and pushing others further to the edge of the square after about 100 protesters defied a 9am eviction order from Melbourne City Council

read more: http://www.3aw.com.au/blogs/breaking-news-blog/occupy-melbourne-getting-turfed/20111021-1mb09.html

[Matilda]

5. Police have removed their ID badges,

according to Twitter accounts from OccupyMelbourne.

That's illegal, but it was a tactic they used during Vietnam demos as well. Bullies and cowards.

[Matilda]

6. Youtube video from #OccupyMelbourne

According to tweets, the protesters had cleaned their site this morning, but the cops tipped over rubbish bins so it looked as if the protesters had made the mess. Now they are gathering up protesters' belonging and taking them to the rubbish tip.

Cops always go too far, and this can only add to the numbers of #OccupyMelbourne; they are saying they will reassemble somewhere else.

Cops are fools - they are part of the 99%.

Edit: link added: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZRgxXgUh1Vg

[Hissyspit]

7. ‘Occupy Melbourne’ Violently Torn Apart by Police

Source: Herald Sun / Raw Story

‘Occupy Melbourne’ violently torn apart by police

By Stephen C. Webster
Friday, October 21, 2011

A large gathering of protesters in Melbourne, Australia was violently disrupted by police last night, with activists forcibly evicted from a public park.

The struggle ensued after roughly 100 protesters defied an order to leave City Square, and police said about 20 were ultimately arrested. The number of activists grew to about 400 as police began moving in, according to The Herald Sun.

That same number of people suffered minor injuries in the melee, according to The Associated Press, but only two were officers.

Video from the chaos shows a dramatic and frightful scene, with police beating, choking and dragging young people away. The main group of youths remained largely peaceful, locking arms to make it more difficult for police to break them up.

Read more: http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/10/21/occupy-melbourne-violently-torn-apart-by-police/

---

[truthisfreedom]

8. The whole world is watching.

That doesn't look good.

[indypaul]

14. Will they never learn?

First they ignore you,
then they laugh at you,
then they fight you,
then you win,
M. Gandhi

[Juneboarder]

15. I've seen this quote floating all over the internet

yet, I went to quote it myself and found on Wikipedia that it's not proven Ghandi said this.

"First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.
Describing the stages of a winning strategy of nonviolent activism. There is no record of Gandhi saying this. A close variant of the quotation first appears in a 1918 US trade union address by Nicholas Klein:
And, my friends, in this story you have a history of this entire movement. First they ignore you. Then they ridicule you. And then they attack you and want to burn you. And then they build monuments to you. And that, is what is going to happen to the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America.
Proceedings of the Third Biennial Convention of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America (1918), p. 53"


http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Mohandas_Karamchand_Gandhi

[indypaul]

18. Had heard this quote before

could not find it using my limited resources attributed to
M. Gandhi. However, found it attributed to him at www.brainyquote.com

Realize this may not be a reliable source for direct attribution.
However, posted it here for what I believe is more or less the
natural progression of actions like OWS. One can always hope.

[Pacifist Patriot]

9. Interesting. I've been following them on Facebook.

The organizers seem like a neat group of folks.

[ZombieHorde]

10. Recommended. nt

[Festivito]

11. Hmmm. The police are behaving badly in FOX news' home country.

What will be said?

[haikugal]

12. It looks like they have RWA's in charge there just like we do.

Horrible way to treat peaceful citizens. But, hey, we're bringing democracy to the Middle East eh?

[Liberalynn]

17. Its so Ironic

how TPTB in the Western Countries pretend to applaud and promote Democracy elsewhere when they squash it in their own nations especially in the U.S. I hope more and more people start to question the hypocrisy of that around the world.

[ixion]

13. Every time the PTB try to tear us down, it will only make us stronger

and prove that our cause is just and proper and spot on.

[Hissyspit]

16. kick nt

[Matilda]

19. Murdoch's Australian newspaper condemns police violence.

While not completely supportive of the Occupy movment, the editorial in Rupert Murdoch's flagship journal The Australian didn't mince words this morning in its condemantion of the actions of both the Lord Mayor and the Victorian Police Force in yesterday's violent removal of protesters in Melbourne.

"If as a nation we support those declaring their aspirations in Cairo's Tahrir Square or before that in Beijing's Tiananmen Square and Berlin's Potsdamer Platz, then we surely are bound to defend the rights of the "occupy" movement. Although their grievances are, in our judgment, comparatively frivolous, the principle is the same. The Melbourne activists want to share their angst about our economic system and we affirm their right to do so. Any public or official desire to move them on must be weighed against our general disposition to tolerate dissent. Any authority to close the protest down should be exercised only as a last resort and with the greatest restraint."

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/opinion/occupying-the-protesters-time/story-e6frg71x-1226173476574

The Australian is generally so biased in favour of rightwing arch-conservatism I don't bother to read it, but this was tweeted this morning by OccupyMelbourne, and it was well said. While I don't know anything about Melbourne's Lord Mayor (I'm a Sydneysider), the Victorian Police are a byword for brutality. Unfortunately, yesterday was all too typical, and today the Police Chief is denying everything. They don't seem to realise just how many cameras were on them.

[Violet_Crumble]

20. I wonder why the Victorian police can't live down their rep for heavy-handedness...

I've seen footage of it and thanks should go to the Victorian Police and the Lord Mayor for giving the occupy movement so much publicity they wouldn't have gotten otherwise. There was one here*, and not a cop in sight and it went off without a hitch and little media attention...

* Here being Canberra, where the media were too busy obsessively focusing on how spritely all those aging Floriade blooms would be looking for the Queen to concern themselves with anything else...

[Violet_Crumble]

21. Police move in on Occupy Sydney: protesters say 50 arrests made

The Occupy Sydney group says police removed protesters from Martin Place in the city early today, claiming about 50 people were arrested.

Police confirmed an operation is underway at Martin Place, where hundreds of protesters have gathered over recent days.

The protesters say hundreds of riot police moved in to clear sleeping members of the Occupy Sydney group and remove their belongings.

They say about 80 occupants there were told they had 10 minutes to leave, but police moved before the time was over and began arresting people and confiscating property


Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/police-move-in-on-occupy-sydney--protesters-say-50-arrests-made-20111023-1me59.html#ixzz1bY84ZtIw