Göteborg: Eye-witness from new school attack

by Filippa Beijer (IMC sweden) 18.06.2001 04:10 Themen: Weltweit
6:03pm Sat Jun 16 01 (Modified on 5:16pm Sun Jun 17 '01)

"....When they arrived they had automatic guns with laser cross. They ordered me and my friend to lay down at the ground. It was very wet and cold after the rain. I was hit with a baton because I wasn't fast enough. Then we heard the dogs come...."

At 10 PM tonight, Saturday June 17th a young woman named Tove was just finishing her dinner. She was sitting by the stairs outside in the chilly air at the Schillerska school. A place of accomodation organised for travellers gathering in Gothenburg for the EU-demonstrations. Suddenly two police vans arrived with a team of policemen dressed in all black with shields covering their faces and helmets without identification numbers. This is her story:
"When they arrived they had automatic guns with laser cross. They ordered me and my friend to lay down at the ground. It was very wet and cold after the rain. I was hit with a baton because I wasn't fast enough. Then we heard the dogs come. We didn't understand what we had done, but the police only replied; "We have our orders".The police brought everyone else out and ordered them to the ground, there were about seventy people all in all. Some of them had no shoes and only t-shirts on. One of the policemen said; (SWE) "Lat skiten ligga, om de inte försöker resa pa sig. Da bankar vi ner dem". (ENG) "Let the dirtbags lay, unless they try to stand up. Then we'll knock them down." They kicked me because I didn't have my hands behind my neck. There was a woman who was breastfeeding that was also forced down despite her condition. Another girl got musklecramps. She was allowed to sit up, but not to go inside because there was no surveilance there. A young man was ordered to lay down in a puddle of dog food. The policemen then mocked him, making jokes about dogfood being excpensive. I was held for an hour. Everyone that was let go was filmed and had to give up name and social security number. Foreigners and demonstrators they recognized from eralier, were kept several more hours then the swedes. I don't know for how long they had to lay there."

The young people kept inside Schillerska School came out scared and chocked by the rough treatment they recieved from the police. Without even an explenation for why, the were they treated like criminals and made to leave their personal details. The question is why they were even kept at all, what crime had they commited? And why were the police protecting their own identity with blank helmets and shields? Whatever answer the police will give, I feel no one deserves to be treated like these young peoplewere treated tonight.Tove ends her story saying. "It's like they didn't see us as human beings any more. We were treated without any respect or understanding. We were just houligans, a dangerous problem to be solved."
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Ergänzungen

Terrorist police

kw--grundrechte@exmail.de 18.06.2001 - 14:45
As long as police does not have identification numbers on their helmets (even police in corruption-driven thailand has), police as a whole is a fascistic and terroristic organisation which has to be fighted as every criminal organisation which threatens freedom and life.

Yeah

flux 18.06.2001 - 15:21
The police should take the anarchist as an example. All of them have ID numbers on their helmets.

you are..

pigface 18.06.2001 - 18:21
so FUCKIN' FUNNY!
shut the fuck up you cop-ass, rightwing-idiot, or whatever you call yourself!!
your infantile comment has fuckin nothing to do with this topic here. and even you have no answer why the police has the right to abuse people who have FUCKING NOTHING DONE!!
(and later on, noone's got a clue why the riots started...)

Covered faces

Jakob 18.06.2001 - 22:16
I believe we demonstrators should dare to stand up for our beliefs with name and without hoods. People in hoods just show disrespect for democracy. They believe in violence as a mean - something I consider utter fascistic.

Non-violence and more openness.

// Jakob