Global 99 Percent Rally Worldwide in Solidarity With Occupy Wall Street
by:
Cara Buckley and Rachel Donadio, The New York Times News Service | Report
Demonstrators with Occupy Wall Street in Zuccotti Park react to the
news that a scheduled clean up was cancelled, in New York, Oct. 14,
2011. (Photo: Victor Blue / The New York Times)
Buoyed by the longevity of the Occupy Wall Street encampment
in Manhattan, a wave of protests swept across Asia, the Americas and
Europe on Saturday, with hundreds and in some cases thousands of people
expressing discontent with the economic tides in marches, rallies and
occasional clashes with the police.
In Rome, a rally thick with tension spread over several miles. Small
groups of restive young people turned a largely peaceful protest into a
riot, setting fire to at least one building and a police van and
clashing with police officers, who responded with water cannons and tear
gas. The police estimated that dozens of protesters had been injured,
along with 26 law enforcement officials; 12 people were arrested.
At least 88 people were arrested in New York, including 24 accused of
trespassing in a Greenwich Village branch of Citibank and 45 during a
raucous rally of thousands of people in and around Times Square. More
than 1,000 people filled Washington Square Park at night, but almost all
of them left after dozens of police officers with batons and helmets
streamed through the arch and warned that they would be enforcing a
midnight curfew. Fourteen were arrested for remaining in the park.
Other than Rome’s, the demonstrations across Europe were largely
peaceful, with thousands of people marching past ancient monuments and
gathering in front of capitalist symbols like the European Central Bank
in Frankfurt. Similar scenes unfolded across cities on several
continents, including in Sydney, Australia; Tokyo; Hong Kong; Toronto; Chicago; and Los Angeles, where several thousand people marched to City Hall as passing drivers honked their support.
But just as the rallies in New York have represented a variety of
messages — signs have been held in opposition to President Obama yards
away from signs in support of him — so did Saturday’s protests contain a
grab bag of sentiments, opposing nuclear power, political corruption
and the privatization of water.
Yet despite the difference in language, landscape and scale, the
protests were united in frustration with the widening gap between the
rich and the poor.
“I have no problem with capitalism,” Herbert Haberl, 51, said in
Berlin. “But I find the way the financial system is functioning deeply
unethical . We shouldn’t bail out the banks. We should bail out the
people.”
In New York, where the occupation of Zuccotti Park in Lower Manhattan
was moving into its second month, a large crowd marched north early
Saturday afternoon to Washington Square Park, where it was joined by
several hundred college students who decried, among other things,
student debt and unemployment.
In late afternoon, the crowds marched up Avenue of the Americas toward a
heavily barricaded Times Square, beseeching onlookers to join in with
cries of “You are the 99 percent.”
At Times Square, they convened with thousands of other protesters and
caught hundreds of tourists unawares. “We thought they were going to
stay down on Wall Street,” said Sandi Bernard — who is 59 and was
visiting from Waldorf, Md. — while wondering if she would have trouble
making the 8 p.m. curtain call for “Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark.”
Some tourists pumped their fists and whooped from atop double-decker
sightseeing buses as the protesters cheered back. To keep 42nd Street
clear the police shunted marchers up to 46th Street, where officers and
the pressed-in masses had several run-ins. At one point the police
pushed the barricades in toward the crowd, and the crowd pushed back. At
another point two mounted officers moved their horses briefly into the
throng.
Three people were arrested trying to take down barricades, the police
said. Later, as officers tried to disperse people east on 46th Street,
42 people who the police said defied their orders were taken away, in
plastic handcuffs, in three police wagons. One witness, Harry Kaback, a
26-year-old comic selling tickets to the Ha! comedy club, said the
protesters were “getting rowdy” with the police and shouting in their
faces.
For the protesters, marching on Times Square held almost as much significance as did protesting against Wall Street.
“Times Square represents business as usual — buy, buy, buy in this
economic climate, watch the latest show,” said Elias Holtz, 29, a Web
designer who lives in Bushwick, Brooklyn. “But the crisis is
everywhere.”
The protest moved back to Washington Square Park, where people listened
to speeches and debated whether to stay while police officers marched
down Fifth Avenue and into the square. One officer gave a warning as
midnight approached: “The park closes at 2400 hours. You can exit to the
east, west or south. You have 10 minutes.”
Virtually everyone chose to leave, and it was unclear if anyone was arrested. Many headed back to Zuccotti Park, where there is no curfew.
Earlier, about a dozen protesters entered a Chase branch in Lower
Manhattan and withdrew their money from the bank while 300 other people
circled the block, some shouting chants and beating on drums. The former
Chase customers, who declined to reveal how much they had in their
accounts — though a few acknowledged it was not much — said they planned
to put their money into smaller banks or credit unions.
“The more resources we give to small institutions, the more they’ll be
able to provide conveniences like free A.T.M.’s and streamlined online
banking so they can compete with the larger banks,” said Hannah Appel,
33, a postdoctoral fellow at Columbia University.
Five people wearing masks were arrested during the march to Times
Square for “loitering with masks,” said Paul J. Browne, the Police
Department’s chief spokesman, an apparent reference to an old state law
prohibiting masked gatherings (the law does not apply to masquerade
parties).
And two dozen people were arrested at a Citibank branch on LaGuardia Place on trespassing charges.
Some witnesses said that the protesters had tried to leave but were
locked inside by bank employees. “They were trying to leave, but they
wouldn’t let them,” said Meaghan Linick, 23, of Greenpoint, Brooklyn.
She said one woman who had been inside and left was forced back inside by police officers.
Citibank, in a statement, said the protesters “were very disruptive and
refused to leave after being repeatedly asked, causing our staff to
call 911.” The statement continued, “The police asked the branch staff
to close the branch until the protesters could be removed.”
In Washington, several hundred people marched through downtown,
beginning in the early morning, passing by several banks. Escorted by
the police, the marchers also demonstrated in front of the White House
and the Treasury Department before moving on to a rally on the National
Mall, where they were joined by representatives of unions and other
supporters.
“You see how people are beholden to corporate interests no matter how
hard you might have worked to get them elected,” said Kelly Mears, 24, a
former software engineer. “There is a disconnect.”
Saturday’s protests sprang not only from the Occupy Wall Street movement that
began last month in New York, but also from demonstrations in Spain in
May. This weekend, the global protest effort came as finance ministers
and central bankers from the Group of 20 industrialized nations meet in Paris to discuss economic issues, including ways to tackle Europe’s sovereign debt crisis.
Tens of thousands of protesters assembled in Madrid on Saturday
evening, when chants mingled with live music, including a rendition of
Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy,” lending the downtown area an upbeat feel on an
unusually balmy fall afternoon.
Brief clashes were reported in London, where the police were out in
force with dozens of riot vans, canine units and hundreds of officers.
But the gathering, attended by people of all ages, was largely peaceful,
with a picnic atmosphere and people streaming in and out of a nearby
Starbucks.
The WikiLeaks founder, Julian Assange, made an appearance when a crowd
assembled in front of St. Paul’s Cathedral. To loud cheers, Mr. Assange
called the protest movement “the culmination of a dream.”
In Rome, the protests Saturday were as much about the growing
dissatisfaction with the government of Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi,
who narrowly survived a vote of confidence on Friday, as they were
about global financial inequities. Tens of thousands of people turned
out for what started as peaceful protests and then devolved into ugly
violence. The windows of shops and banks were smashed, a police van was
destroyed, and some Defense Ministry offices were set alight.
“We don’t feel represented by the government. We feel made fun of,”
Alessia Tridici, 18, said in Rome. “We’re upset because we don’t have
prospects for the future. We’ll never see a pension. We’ll have to work
until we die.”
Cara Buckley reported from New York, and Rachel Donadio from Rome.
Reporting was contributed by Jack Ewing from Frankfurt; Nicholas Kulish
from Berlin; Joseph Goldstein, Elizabeth A. Harris, Colin Moynihan and
Christopher Maag from New York; Catherine Garcia from Los Angeles;
Raphael Minder from Madrid; Ron Nixon from Washington; and Ravi Somaiya
from London.
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