Reports: Bangladesh factory fire kills at least 25 people - ITUC urges investigation

A crowd gathers as smoke rises from a garment factory at Ashulia, Bangladesh, on Tuesday, Dec. 14, 2010. A devastating blaze raced through the factory, killing at least 25 people and injuring more than 100, witnesses and news reports said. (Photo: Pavel Rahman / AP via Washington Times)

14/12/2010 - Five days after the start of a massive strike in Bangladesh's garment industry which turned already very violent on Sunday (with four dead workers) and two days before the national "Victory Day" (celebrating the end of the 1971 Bangladesh Liberation War), a mysterious fire has today broken out in one Bangladeshi clothes factory at Ashulia, a suburban area about 16 miles north of the capital of Dhaka, and there are contradictory reports that dozens of workers have been killed and hundred injured.

According to the Brussels-based International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) four garment workers were killed and over 200 were injured on 12 December in violent clashes between the workers of apparel factories and members of "law enforcement agencies" (that is to say: bought thugs), when the police opened fire on the protesting workers.

In a letter signed by it's General Secretary Sharan Burrow (photo below), the ITUC has today protested with a fax to Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina (photo below) and urged an independent investigation into these killings ensuring "that those responsible are held to account".

Bangladesh has about 4,000 garment factories that export more than $10 billion worth of products a year, mainly to the United States and Europe. Customers include Wal-Mart, Tesco, H&M, Zara, Carrefour, Gap, Metro, JCPenney, Marks & Spencer, Kohl's, Levi Strauss and Tommy Hilfiger.

From the New York Times:

(article by Julfikar Ali Manik, Dhaka, and Vikas Bajaj, Mumbai, India, published December 14, 2010) :

"Bangladesh Factory Fire Kills at Least 20

A fire at a garment factory north of Dhaka, the capital, killed at least 20 people and injured dozens on Tuesday, in the latest blow to the country’s largest industry.

The fire at a 10-story factory in the Ashulia industrial area, about 16 miles from the capital, started on the ninth floor around lunchtime, when most of the workers were outside. Local reporters who had canvassed hospitals said at least 24 people had been killed. Factory officials said they knew of about 20 deaths.

About 5,000 people worked in the building, producing pants for customers in the United States and Europe, said Delwar Hussain, a deputy managing director at the Ha-Meem Group, which owns the factory. Fire officials were still fighting the fire, which spread to the top floor, into the evening as people gathered at the compound to look for relatives.

It was not immediately clear which Western retailers were supplied by the factory. Garment factories employ about three million Bangladeshis, most of them women, to make clothes for stores like Wal-Mart and H & M.

Just days ago, three people were killed in labor protests. Workers have said they were protesting because some factories had not carried out a government-mandated 80 percent increase in the minimum wage, to 3,000 taka a month or about $43.

It was unclear what had caused the fire at the Ha-Meem factory and whether it was related to the labor unrest. Mr. Hussain said that the company suspected an electrical short circuit, but that investigators from the government and the garment industry association were still working to establish the cause.

Piles of clothes in garment factories are easily combustible. Fires can be very deadly because some factory owners lock exits to prevent workers from leaving their machines. Mr. Hussain said the doors at the company’s factory had not been locked.

International labor groups have criticized the safety of Bangladesh's garment factories. A factory fire outside Dhaka in February killed more than 20 people.

The Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association said it would pay the families of workers killed in the Ha-Meem fire 100,000 taka (about $1,400), and the company has promised to pay another 100,000 taka.

Mr. Hussain said the company hoped to reopen the first eight floors of the factory as early as Tuesday because they did not appear to be damaged. He said the company expected to meet all pending orders. The ninth floor was used as a finishing area where workers prepared shipments, and the 10th floor housed a dining hall, he said. "




See also

HA-MIM FIRE - 'It 's an act of sabotage' (bdnews24.com, Bangladesh)

Bangladesh police shoot striking garment workers (World Socialist Web Site)

27 killed, 100 injured in Bangladeshi factory blaze (AP via Washington Times)

Bangladesh clothes workers die in factory fire (BBC)

People looked at a burning garment factory in Ashulia, Bangladesh (Photo: Andrew Bilaj / Reuters via NYT)

Sharan Burrow, the General Secretary of the International Trade Union Confederation, speaking at Labour Day 2007 in Queensland, Australia (Photo: Wikipedia)

Sheikh Hasina Wazed, the Prime Minister of Bangladesh, 17/10/2000 (DoD photo by R. D. Ward)

Workers rushed to rescue stricken colleagues after the fire (Photo: Reuters via BBC)

Bangladesh: Four people killed and hundreds injured during garment workers protests

Bangladesh garment workers are protesting since Friday for the implementation of a minimum wage law which should already come into force in November (The photo, dating possibly from an earlier demonstration, is from the European Pressphoto Agency via Al Jazeera - See video about similar protests in Summer)


From today's Agence France Press:



"Bangladesh garment protests spread after deaths


DHAKA — Protests by Bangladeshi garment workers over low wages spread on Monday, a day after four people were killed in violent clashes between demonstrators and the police.

More than 4,000 garment factory staff blocked roads and staged a sit-in in the northern district of Gazipur, one of the country's main manufacturing areas which produces clothes for many Western brands.

On Sunday, four people were killed in the southeastern port town of Chittagong, where police fired live bullets and tear gas shells to control riots.

Dozens of people were also injured at protests in the capital Dhaka.

Bangladesh's garment workers have been angered that a government hike in wages has not yet been implemented by some employers, while senior staff complain they will not benefit from the new pay structure.

"They have blocked the main highway linking Dhaka to the north of the country," Khandaker Shafiqul Alam, police inspector at Gazipur, told AFP.

"The protests are led by senior workers who are frustrated that they have lost out under the new wage scheme," he said, referring to the new minimum wage plan introduced in November.

Bangladesh's 4,500 garment factories, many of which produce clothes for retailers such as Wal-Mart, H&M and Levi Strauss, must now pay workers at least 3,000 taka (43 dollars) a month -- up 80 percent on the 2006 minimum wage.

In Chittagong, 30 people have been arrested and criminal cases have been lodged against a further 3,000 over involvement in the recent violence, Kusun Dewan, deputy commissioner of police in Chittagong, told AFP.

Garments accounted for 80 percent of the country's 16.2 billion dollars of annual exports last year. Bangladesh's factories employ more than three million workers, about 85 percent of them women."

See also

Bangladesh police shoot striking garment workers (World Socialist Web Site)

Garment Worker Riots in Bangladesh Continue After 4 Killed (Time Magazine Newsfeed /Krista Mahr)

Labor violence in Bangladesh (The Donga-Al Ilbo, South Korea)

Six Korean firms hit by Bangladesh protests (The Korea Herald via Asia News Network)

Deadly wage protests in Bangladesh (Al Jazeera)

Bangladesh police break up workers protests: three dead (Reuters India)

Bangladesh raids militant hideout, detains five (Reuters India)

Proteste der Textilarbeiter in Bangladesch weiten sich aus (AFP Germany)

Tote bei Arbeiterprotesten in Bangladesh: Viele Verletzte bei gewaltsamen Ausschreitungen (LabourNet, Germany, mit umfangreichem Dossier)

Fleeing Catastrophe, Stuck in the Slums of Bangladesh (Time Magazine Video)

Photos from this weekend's protests: AFP via The Peninsula Qatar, Getty Images via Time Magazine and APA/EPA via Der Standard

Greece: Attica citizens clash wildly with police over landfill site

From Act for Freedom Now ! (see also here):

"The residents of the Attican district of Keratea (around 41 km south-east of Athens) have gathered since early Saturday morning at Ovriokastro in opposing against the State’s decision to build up a garbage storage area on the certain spot. The State has decided to build up the garbage storage area of the whole Attica’s waste on Ovriokastro, despite the fact that the certain spot is officially an archeological site (decision of the Central Archeological Council). In the mobilization of the citizens participate also members of the major council who also provided citizens with the town-hall’s vehicles. Earlier on Saturday, around 5:00, police forces arrived at Ovriokastro in order to guard the area, so bulldozers could started construction. Hundreds of people started directing on the spot trying to block the construction.

The police reacted in their usual neo-fascistic methods by throwing tear-gas, sound-shine grenades and beating up children, youths, men and women, people in their third age.

The citizens responded with stones, Molotov cocktails, flaming barricades and woods they could find around in order to protect themselves and nature. After the straight reactionof the citizens the pigs stated that they would leave the spot, accepting that their presencethere is illegal. Instead, more police started gathering (around 400 of special police) but also more citizens started directing to Ovriokastro. During the clashes, a small fire raised up “accidentally” in the forest because of a tear-gas canister.

Later the three water canon cop-vehicles started directing also on the spot, while a cop-helicopterwas continuously flying above the mountain. The police remained in the area forthe whole night.

The companies who are involved in the certain construction:

ΜΕΣΟΓΕΙΟΣΑ.Ε. - ΠΡΟΕΤΑ.Ε. - ENDRACO Α.Τ.Ε.

On Sunday mourning around 2000 people started directing towards the spot.

The police started the war for one more time and the citizens kept on defending with any weapon they could find around. The clashes kept on during the whole afternoon with the cops beating up even children and women but also having a water-canon with them – important to mention that this is the first time of its use after the fall of the military junta.

Mr. Marinos Aliferis, a journalist, was injured by the pigs’ violence and had to go to Evaggelismos Hospital. Civil cops have also switched off for several minutes the live-streaming camera of zougla.gr.

Meanwhile, flaming barricades are set up on Lavriou Avenue and some citizens have also sabotaged the electricity supply. Also shots from a gun have been heard in afternoon, possibly from citizens who shot on the air to make the police think twice about their actions.The guerrilla keeps on until the time that this article is being written with barricades on several roads, attacks with stones and Molotov cocktails and body to body fights.The citizens have made it to keep the police stepping back anytime they were trying to attack. Tones of tear-gas have been thrown but the people still resist. Residents from other areas have started directing to the spot driving also four bulldozers with them in order to protect themselves from police violence. The people have announced that they will remain there for the whole night."

See on the problem of garbage management in Greece:

http://landfillsgrece.blogspot.com/

Best practice

Police told schoolboy Nicky Wishart he would be arrested if his picket at David Cameron's office sparked unrest (Photo: Virginia Phelps)

From the Guardian via Fefes Blog

(Article by Shiv Malik, Friday 10 December 2010 17.49 GMT):

"Schoolboy warned by police over picket plan at David Cameron's office

Nicky Wishart, 12, told he faced arrest if public disorder ensued and armed officers would be present

The mother of a 12-year-old boy has criticised Thames Valley police for taking her son out of lessons because he was planning to picket David Cameron's constituency office today.

Nicky Wishart, a pupil at Bartholomew School, Eynsham, Oxfordshire, organised the event on Facebook to highlight the plight of his youth centre, which is due to close in March next year due to budget cuts.

The protest, which was due to take place today, has attracted over 130 people on Facebook, most of whom are who use youth centres in Cameron's constituency, Witney.

Wishart said that after the school was contacted by anti-terrorist officers, he was taken out of his English class on Tuesday afternoon and interviewed by a Thames Valley officer at the school in the presence of his head of year. During the interview, Wishart says that the officer told him that if any public disorder took place at the event he would be held responsible and arrested.

Speaking to the Guardian, Nicky Wishart said: "In my lesson, [a school secretary] came and said my head of year wanted to talk to me. She was in her office with a police officer who wanted to talk to me about the protest. He said, 'if a riot breaks out we will arrest people and if anything happens you will get arrested because you are the organiser'.

"He said even if I didn't turn up I would be arrested and he also said that if David Cameron was in, his armed officers will be there 'so if anything out of line happens ...' and then he stopped."
Wishart, who describes himself as a "maths geek" said he was frightened by the encounter. "I was really scared. Normally I'm a confident speaker but I lost all my confidence. My mum was worried, and I was worried and I didn't know what to do."

Wishart's mother, Virginia Phelps, 41, said: "On Monday I got a phone call in the afternoon at the school from one of the senior staff members, saying, 'we've had the police here, it's to do with the anti-terrorist group, they've taken an interest in something Nicky's posted on FB'.

"I was under the impression that the police would come to the house and speak with us in the evening but I am absolutely fuming that they spoke to him when I wasn't present, especially when I live just 10 minutes from the school."

Speaking about the youth club, Phelps, a mother of three added, "Over the last few months, the kids have been trying to keep the youth club open, raising money by cleaning cars. They've raised £140. Through the club they've been had all sorts of experiences that I couldn't afford to give them myself."

Despite the police visit, Wishart said he would continue with the picket today and he would be delivering a letter to Cameron's staff about the youth centre closure.

A spokeswoman for Thames Valley police said: "We have dedicated officers who work in partnership with all the schools in our area to make sure young people remain in education and in a safe learning environment.

"On Tuesday 7 December, our schools officer for west Oxfordshire attended the school in Eynsham and spoke to a 12-year-old boy in the company of the pupil's head of year, about a planned protest. This was not with the intention of dissuading him from organising it, but to obtain information regarding the protest to ensure his and others' safety. As with any demonstration, we always aim to facilitate a peaceful protest."

The headmaster of Bartholomew school, Andrew Hamilton, refused to give comment saying that it was something that the school was "dealing with internally"."

Common sense

UK student protests turn into heavy riots, as tuition hike passes in Parliament

9/12/2010 - The UK student protests reached a new climax Thursday with heavy riots around Westminster, as the House of Commons approved plans to increase tution fees for students in England to up to £9,000 per year. The move was carried by 323 votes to 302, which means that the Conservative-Liberal coalition government's notional majority narrowed of 84 to 21. Although all 57 Lib Dem MPs said before the election that they would oppose any rise in tuition fees, 28 of them voted for the hike, while even 6 Tory backbenchers voted no.

The day had begun with new demonstrations and sit-ins throughout Britain followings weeks of nationwide protests, university occupations and direct actions lobbying or targeting MPs. Maybe 25.000 students were marching through central London, repeatedly attempting to break through police lines or rushing down side streets, determined to reach parliament. Although it was announced that protesters would not be allowed into Parliament Square, students surged in, getting close to the House of Commons, while the police began to “kettle” people then tore into them. They started with baton charges then galloped in on horseback (aerial view video), whereby one rider fell from his horse (Video from Sky News)

A live protest map also here

Subsequently students launched themselves at police lines and barriers, and tore down the fencing around the grass in Parliament Square (Video), forcing the police to retreat behind barricades as the Parliament Square and the surrounding streets were finally occupied (see Video roundup , Video). A group of around 150 students, furious at being stopped from joining the protest outside parliament, occupied the National Gallery at Trafalgar Square, others set off to march through central London .

When the Commons' vote finally became known in the early evening, some protesters tried to ram their way through the doors of the Treasury, chanting "One solution, revolution", and started using concrete blocks and metal poles to smash windows of the building on Great George Street while being contained inside the square. Others attacked the Supreme Court or vandalized statues in Westminster Square, including one of Winston Churchill.

Three quarter hours before the attack on the Supreme Court, around 7:15 p.m., Prince Charles and Camilla entered the scene, as if the royal protocol wished to reserve them also a little role in this riot theatre: Their limousine, a 1977 Rolls Royce Phantom VI, was attacked by protesters in Regent Street as they travelled to London Palladium for a Royal Variety Performance. A rear window was smashed and paint bombs were hurled at the vintage car, but the princely couple stayed unharmed (Video, Amateur footage & witnesses). The Duchess of Cornwall tried to brave the situation even with historic sense of mind: “There’s a first time for everything,” she told reporters before the couple drove off in an armored police truck after the performance.

At nearly the same time, around 7:25 p.m, a group of up to 1,000 students were marching down Oxford Street, chanting "General strike now". A branch of Topshop, owned by billionaire Philip Green, who has been targeted for not paying taxes on company dividends in the United Kingdom, was savaged on the way, while bins were overturned and police were attacked on Oxford Street, causing panic among shoppers.

Altogether some 38 protesters and 10 officers have been injured according to official reports. Six officers required hospital treatment and four suffered minor injuries. So far 20 people have been arrested: nine for violent disorder, two for arson, two for assault on police, two for criminal damage, one for being drunk and disorderly and four for burglary.

Meanwhile, a law professor, Ian Grigg-Spall, said he lodged a legal complaint calling for Lib Dem leader and Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg to be prosecuted for fraud over the controversial tuition fees under Section 2 of the Fraud Act.

Students lay siege to House of Commons (Socialist Worker Online, UK, with links, timeline etc.)

Britain: the student revolt (In Defense of Marxism, large roundup)

For whom the fee tolls - The Debt Generation fights back, as Parliament votes on fees (SchNEWS, UK, compact story of events)

Police brutally attack protesters as UK parliament backs university fees hike (World Socialist Web Site)

Da Londra: L'avanguardia balla il dubstep (Mercato Occupato, Bari, Italy)

Royal car attacked in protest after MPs' fee vote (BBC, roundup with video)

Tuition fees: government wins narrow victory as protests continue (The Guardian)

Protesters Attack Car Carrying Prince Charles (New York Times)

police/media lies - student protest pics & report (Indymedia London)

London tuition fee protest (Boston Globe, The Big Picture, big-formated photos)

Students smash the police in London (Anorak.co.uk, 66 photos)

Protesters attack royal couple yes! and yes! British students riot in London (Act for Freedom Now, photos)

Prince Charles and Camilla caught up in tuition fees protest violence (Liverpool Daily Post, UK)

Sarah Teather votes for tuition fee hike (Willesden & Brent Times)

UK backs tuition hike amid furore (Al Jazeera)

Cameron condena la violencia de "una minoría" en las protestas estudiantiles (El País, Spain)

Londres: manifestations violentes sur fond de débat parlementaire (Agence France Presse)

Londra: 20mila persone assediano la Camera dei Comuni e assalto all’auto di Carlo e Camilla (La Repubblica, Italy, via Contro l'Informazione Manipulata)

Englische Uni-Reform : Wütende Studenten attackieren Limousine von Prinz Charles (Der Spiegel, Germany)

Studentenproteste: Randalierer greifen Charles und Camilla an (Focus, Germany)

"An Opposition, on coming into power, is often like a speculative merchant whose bills become due. Ministers have to make good their promises, and they find a difficulty in so doing. They have said the state of things is so-and-so, and if you give us the power we will do thus and thus. Of course, something must be done: the speculative merchant cannot forget his bills." (Walter Bagehot, The English Constitution, 1867, Chapter V)

"The House of Commons is thronged with people who get there merely for 'social purposes', as the phrase goes; that is, that they and their families may go to parties else impossible." (Walter Bagehot, The English Constitution, 1867, Chapter II).

"In all cases it must be remembered that a political combination of the lower classes, as such and for their own objects, is an evil of the first magnitude; that a permanent combination of them would make them (now that so many of them have the suffrage) supreme in the country; and that their supremacy, in the state they now are, means the supremacy of ignorance over instruction, and of numbers over knowledge. So long as they are not taught to act together, there is a chance of this being averted, and it can only be averted by the greatest wisdom and the greatest foresight of the higher classes." (Walter Bagehot, The English Constitution, Introduction to 2nd ed., 1872)

Photo No. 2: The Open Society and Its Enemies: Liberal Democrats Party Leader Nick Clegg and Vince Cable on 11th April 2010 as they put the finishing touches to the Liberal Democrats party election manifesto at Mr Clegg's Putney home.

UK: Bank occupations and school sleep-ins ahead of Commons' fee vote

8/12/2010 - Pupils at some London schools say they will sleep in school to protest against plans to triple tuition fees in England and cut university funding. At the same time, there have been several demonstrations across England and Scotland in the build-up to Thursday's Commons' vote on the controversial plans. Occupations have been continuing at about 20 universities, including Exeter and Leeds - where protestors have squatted now also a branch of Santander Bank on the campus (see Youtube video below).

In Dundee, a group of protesters broke away from the demonstration and entered the nearby Royal Bank of Scotland branch in High Street to continue their action. They blocked customers coming in and out of the bank and waved anti-capitalism banners. In London, a flash "teach-in" demonstration was held by protestors at Euston Station. Earlier, a group dressed as suffragettes demonstrated outside the constituency offices of Lib Dem minister Lynne Featherstone in north London, while the Education minister Sarah Teather, when asked by Sky News about her vote, lost stante pede all her oratorial soft skills and preferred to run away... (Video here).

Pupils stage university tuition fee rise occupations (BBC, today's roundup)

Students Stage Protests Ahead Of Fees Vote (Sky News, roundup)

Student protests – live coverage (The Guardian)

Students storm Royal Bank of Scotland in protest over fees (NEWS.Scotsman.com)

Clegg cast as panto villain as Durham students make their voices heard (The Northern Echo)

VIDEO: Falmouth students march through the streets (Falmouth People)

Clashes hit Milan's La Scala opening night - Barenboim speaks out

7/12/2010 - Protesters clashed with Italian riot police on Tuesday in front of Milan's world-famous La Scala opera house. Hours before an opera season opening performance of Richard Wagner's The Valkyrie was due to open at La Scala, students let off flares and smoke bombs as part of protests against government higher education reforms currently in parliament.

Inside La Scala, conductor Daniel Barenboim used the opportunity to lobby Italy's president, Giorgio Napolitano, who was in the audience. Turning to the stalls before the performance began, Barenboim announced that “in the names of the colleagues who play, sing, dance and work, not only here but in all theatres, I am here to tell you we are deeply worried for the future of culture in the country and in Europe."

He then read out the ninth article of the Italian constitution, which includes a promise to protect the country’s "historical and artistic heritage" as well as promoting "the development of culture and scientific and technical research."


Italy: Clashes hit Milan's La Scala opening night (ADNKronos, Italy)

Clashes mar La Scala season opener (DPA via Monsters & Critics)

7 dicembre - Prima della Scala Milano: una generazione precaria in rivolta! (MilanoX via Uniriot, Italy, background article)

Verso la sfiducia – Le rivolte non si fermano (Atenei in rivolta, Italy, also about today's actions in Bari, Catania, Roma, Torino)

Verletzte bei Protesten vor Scala-Premiere (APA via Der Standard, Austria)

Photo: Luca Bruni /AP

Anniversary of Rage

Athens, December 6th: When the joint student/teacher demonstration gathered at 11 a.m., the police had already closed roads and deployed several thousand officers around the city. The first two banners read: "Pupils and workers against the IMF memorandum - Money for schools, not for banks - Resistance Coordination of the Pupils' Initiatives" - "Our dreams are bullet-proof (alexisphaira) - Sixth class". In the Greek capital, this rallye was today only one of several protest marches and gatherings in memory of the shooting of Alexandros Grigoropoulos. In 17 Greek cities people took to the streets to commemorate the second anniversary of his murder, and there were also a lot of memorial gatherings or solidarity actions in other countries (for example in London /2/, Newcastle, Berlin, Hamburg, Weimar or Munich, see Contra Info roundup).

Struggle for Freedom against the State of Terror. December 6th, 2010
Nationwide report on the demonstrations of December 6th and the unprecedented police aggression. Solidarity actions around the world. (Contra Info, very large roundup !)

Demonstrations and actions in 17 Greek cities mark two-year anniversary of the state assassination of Alexandros Grigoropoulos; police announce unprecedented traffic ban in central Athens (From the Greek Streets, UK)

96 people detained in Athens, 42 of which have been arrested (From the Greek Streets, Photos)

Riots return to Greece, 2 years after teen's death (Associated Press, with Photos)

Riot police storm metro station in Athens – plus other videos from the day’s demos (From the Greek Streets)

Brutal represión contra miles de manifestantes en el segundo aniversario del asesinato de Alexis (Alasbarricadas, Spain)

London students show Solidarity with Greek students (Youtube)

Massenunruhen in Athen (Indymedia Germany)

Auseinandersetzungen in Athen (Indymedia Germany)

Remembering Alexandros Grigoropoulos

When he was shot by the police officer Korkoneas, the Greek teenager Alexandros Grigoropoulos was as young as the British school student who took the floor at the Coalition of Resistance Conference in London.

Fifteen years.

Tomorrow Alexis is gone for two years.

He’s gone to a university occupation in London, standing behind a barricade in Rome, protesting in the streets of Dublin…

Generation X2

See also the commentary of Edward Fullbrook on the Real-World Economics Review Blog

Greek students protest over education reform and clash with police

Athens, December 2nd: During a "paneducational rally" students try to break through a police cordon in front of the Greek Parliament. The demonstration marched also to the British embassy in Athens, in solidarity with British students who oppose plans to increase tuition fees.

From Independent Television News (ITN), UK:

"University students across Greece took to the streets in protest for the second day running on against the government's planned education cuts.

Students said they were also acting in solidarity with British students, by taking their demonstration to the British Embassy in Athens.

Greek students fear the education reform will lead to cost cuts in education and new tuition fees. Police arrested several students after clashes broke out and at least one student was injured.

Police used tear gas on the students after they charged officers in an attempt to break a police cordon in front of parliament.

This was the third protest in the last few weeks as the Education Ministry discusses reforms in the system, to be announced in the next few months.The government's planned education reforms include shrinking and merging public colleges and universities and reducing the teaching workforce.The reforms come as the government has implemented general economic measures to reign in spending, cut costs, and increase revenues to reduce their debt. Some of the measures, including wage cuts and lay-offs, have angered workers. Protests have died down since the beginning of the year but various labour groups continue to keep up the momentum."

See also

photos on Indymedia Athens: protest march - police brutality - mural slogans

Greece: Clashes at student rally (Associated Press)

Greek police clash with students at British embassy (Reuters)

This is just the beginning

November 30th: The day when the Camera dei deputati voted the Law Gelmini, the city of Bologna, home of the oldest university of Europe, lived to see like many other Italian cities a veritable student & pupil revolt. Urban blockades and demonstrations paralyzed the city, then the protest march blocked the motorway for over an hour. Finally at the train station, another possible target for blockades, a long phalanx of Police and Carabinieri in riot-gear attacked the crowd and fired tear gas on the march. After around twenty minutes of extremely high tension, the march restarted to block Via Rizzoli and Via Zamboni, before returning to the Faculty of Arts where a meeting was held at six o’clock.

This is today’s English leader from the website Uniriot.org, written by Paolo Do, Rome, which gives a roundup of the Italian events on Tuesday 30th November:

“It is just the beginning !

These days the crisis of the Italian government, that is living an agony since the last two months, was spread over the country: students’ protests, occupations everywhere are unfolding the political crisis. We are facing a multiplication of its dimensions, of its temporalities.
From the «book block» to the occupation of rail stations, airport, port, cities, the Italian student movement is experimenting an original temporality of the crisis: it is a non-linear time, that is a new starting point of resistance against the European austerity.

For the first time hundred of student from high school are beside the university’s student composing a new subject, a new political event.

The clinamen of the 30 of November, as well as of the event at the Milbank tower in London few weeks ago, are fed with the anger of a new generation, their desire and collective organization.
Yesterday Italy was completely blocked by demonstrations that closed motorways, like in Bologna and Turin, where the mobility was blocked for hours.

Here Bologna

Here Turin

In Rome students clashed violently with police several time to reach the Parliament, and then blocked the city centre and the main railway station:

Here the clash at the Roma downtown

Here

Here the occupation of Termini

The day of 30 November shows us a new kind of protest beyond the rituality: in all over the country the student movement is facing the attempt to organize strikes blocking the mobility and fluidity of the metropolis, its hubs and centre of logistic.

Here the clash at the rail station of Bologna

Here Pavia

Up to today, many universities are still occupied. General assemblies and meetings are going all over the cities despite yesterday the reform was passed to the Parliament. The next step for this law will be the discussion at the Senate house by 14 of December. But the government probably will not have enough time: we will topple them before: yes, it is just the beginning!"

See also

Movement, learning: a few reflections on the exciting UK winter 2010 (by Manuela Zechner, London, on Uniriot.org)

Against the reform, another revolt! Updates on student protests in Italy (Italy Calling via Libcom)

and the sites Atenei in revolt and Italy Calling

Che fare ? What is to be Done ?

Walk out of school and college. Take action in workplaces. Lay siege to parliament.

If everyone gets behind the student revolt then this government can be beaten over the rise in university tuition fees to £9,000 a year. School, college and university students are on the streets, millions of others support them, and government ministers are in a spin.

Liberal Democrat ministers were this week debating whether or not to vote for the policy they had shaped in the cabinet! If the fees are beaten then it will make it much easier to fight other attacks such as the abolition of the Education Maintenance Allowance that hundreds of thousands of young people rely on.

And it will boost all of us in the battle against this vicious Tory-Lib Dem coalition.

The central date for us all is the day when the fees are voted on by MPs in parliament.

That is scheduled to take place at some time before Christmas. On that day, everyone—student, worker, pensioner, unemployed—should be part of the movement.

Protest, lay siege to Parliament, send a delegation from work to the demonstration, walkout if you can.

Trade union leaders must back the calls for action, as the UCU lecturers’ union already has. The Tories and the lickspittle Liberals are out to wreck our lives. Let’s sink them.

Socialist Worker Online, UK

The claims of the Socialist Workers Party (SWP) and other middle class “left” organisations that building up "direct action" and merely getting larger numbers onto the streets is an adequate strategy for defeating the cuts must be rejected.

Placing all the emphasis on greater protest activity by the students is the means by which the SWP cynically attempts to cover up the complicity of the Labour and trade union bureaucracy with the imposition of the cuts and divert students away from a political struggle against those elements. Especially under conditions in which the state is preparing more severe repression against protests, this would mean leaving the students to fight alone, to be picked off by the police and worn down.

Young people cannot look to disaffected Liberals, the Labour Party or the trade unions to fight back against the efforts to impose the global economic crisis on the backs of working people. They are not a solution to the problem, they are part of it.

Students and youth must make a conscious political turn towards the working class. This is the opposite of the orientation to the Trades Union Congress proposed by the SWP and others. It means linking up with all sections of workers facing cuts in their jobs, wages and living standards through the building of rank-and-file committees in a rebellion against the trade unions. The fight against austerity must be based in a struggle against the capitalist profit system, for the bringing down of the coalition government and for a workers’ government based on socialist policies.

International Students for Social Equality, UK

Picture to yourselves a popular uprising.

Probably everyone will now agree that we must think of this and prepare for it. But how? Surely the Central Committee cannot appoint agents to all localities for the purpose of preparing the uprising. Even if we had a Central Committee, it could achieve absolutely nothing by such appointments under present-day Russian conditions. But a network of agents that would form in the course of establishing and distributing the common newspaper would not have to “sit about and wait” for the call for an uprising, but could carry on the regular activity that would guarantee the highest probability of success in the event of an uprising. Such activity would strengthen our contacts with the broadest strata of the working masses and with all social strata that are discontented with the autocracy, which is of such importance for an uprising. Precisely such activity would serve to cultivate the ability to estimate correctly the general political situation and, consequently, the ability to select the proper moment for an uprising. Precisely such activity would train all local organisations to respond simultaneously to the same political questions, incidents, and events that agitate the whole of Russia and to react to such “incidents” in the most vigorous, uniform, and expedient manner possible; for an uprising is in essence the most vigorous, most uniform, and most expedient “answer” of the entire people to the government. Lastly, it is precisely such activity that would train all revolutionary organisations throughout Russia to maintain the most continuous, and at the same time the most secret, contacts with one another, thus creating real Party unity; for without such contacts it will be impossible collectively to discuss’ the plan for the uprising and to take the necessary preparatory measures on the eve, measures that must be kept in the strictest secrecy.

In a word, the “plan for an all-Russia political newspaper”, far from representing the fruits of the labour of armchair workers, infected with dogmatism and bookishness (as it seemed to those who gave but little thought to it), is the most practical plan for immediate and all-round preparation of the uprising, with, at the same time, no loss of sight for a moment of the pressing day-to-day work …

Class political consciousness can be brought to the workers only from without, that is, only from outside the economic struggle, from outside the sphere of relations between workers and employers. The sphere from which alone it is possible to obtain this knowledge is the sphere of relationships of all classes and strata to the state and the government, the sphere of the interrelations between all classes.

Lenin, What is to be Done ?(1901)

London protesters come here face to face with Metropolitan Police after a new day of marching against the planned university tuition fee increases. Police said 146 demonstrators were arrested after a group of protesters refused to leave Trafalgar Square at the end of the demonstration. There were also ten arrests in Bristol. At least the British Liberal Democrats seem to have come now politically under pressure and mull abstaining in the parliamentary vote on tuition fees, while the Government in Wales decided to spare Welsh students from a rise in tuition fees. (Photo: Reuters)

See

Europeans stage anti-austerity protest (Reuters via ZCommunications.org)

Ddl Gelmini, proteste in tutta Italia La Camera approva la riforma (La Repubblica, Italy, chronology of events)

30 novembre 2010 - Diretta sms - contro il ddl, scontri e blocchi stradali, occupate decine di stazioni, la rivoltà dell'università contro il governo (Uniriot Network, Italy, chronology)

Rolling coverage of student protests on Day X2 (Socialist Worker Online, UK, chronology)

Budget cuts stir protest in Italy, UK (Wall Street Journal Europe)

Protests against tuition fees strain coalition (Reuters UK)

'Non-students to blame for trouble' (The Evening Post, Bristol, UK)

Punished for being English: Welsh students join Scots in being spared tuition fees rise (Daily Mail, UK)

Italian student protests widen and even spread abroad

Oh la la, the Little Mermaid is flattered: A protest gathering of Erasmus students in Copenhagen, Denmark - Their banners read: "No to the Law Gelmini - On the run, but not to Samoa Islands"

29/11/2010- While Italy was drawn into the European debt crisis on Monday for the first time (as its borrowing costs shot up sharply on the financial markets), the massive student revolt in Berlusconistan is still rolling on. On the eve of the very last amendatory lower house decision over the contested education reform (called Law Gelmini), the normal activities of university & schools kept on being dominated by gatherings, protest marches, squats, rooftop occupations and symbolic actions of all sorts. The wave of revolt has now even reached Erasmus students or researchers in Paris, Brussels and other cities, which organized gatherings, prepared flash-mobs and tried to spark the flame of protest also abroad. At the same time, protesting pupils, a lot of professors & academics and important media (as La Repubblica) are supporting (or seem to sympathize with) the revolting students.

See

Università, la riforma al rush finale - Gelmini attaca il rettore di Firenze (La Stampa, 30/11/2010 - 08:30)

Italy drawn into crisis as borrowing costs rise (The Irish Times)

29 novembre - Azioni, blocchi e flash mob in tante città, comunicati dagli Erasmus, poi tutte occupate le facoltà della Sapienza (Uniriot.org, Italy)

Universita' - Roma, Pisa, L'Aquila - Occupazioni in tutta Italia (La Repubblica, Italy)

Università, protesta al Cern di Ginevra. A Pompei striscione contro la riforma (La Repubblica via Uniriot.org)

A central Italian protest webside with updates about ongoing protests is Uniriot.org

Activists in Pompei, Italy, holding banners which read: "Government of public destruction - Today Pompei - Tomorrow the universities"

"The Future is a Black Hole": Rooftop protest of Italian students, doctorands & researchers at the CERN (European Organization for Nuclear Research), Geneva, Switzerland

See

Studenti Protestano Su Tetto Cern Ginevra (ANSA News Agency, Rome)

Picture gallery with Erasmus protesters from Madrid, Tartu (Estonia), Falun (Sweden), Siviliga (Spain), Munich (Germany) and Barcelona (La Repubblica)

Violent scenes at a London townhall meeting, as UK braces for more student protests

29/11/2010 - While British students prepared for their third and biggest education cuts protest day (on Tuesday 30th November), there was fracas and fury in a Southeast London borough, Lewisham, where around 400 protesters tried to force their way into a local council meeting which was to decide about spending cuts. We document here the article from the "Socialist Worker Online" about this event:

"Riot police attack protesters at Lewisham Town Hall

Around 400 people rallied outside Lewisham town hall this evening against plans by the Labour run council to make £60 million cuts. The protest, organised by Lewisham Anti-Cuts Alliance, was boosted by a large feeder march of university students from Goldsmiths College.

After a rally many people rushed into the town hall to voice opposition to the cuts. Around 100 protesters managed to get in.

Police then attacked the protesters with horses, dogs, riot shields and truncheons.

One eyewitness, an NUT (National Union of Teachers) member, told Socialist Worker, “The police were like animals. The beat people with their truncheons and even attacked a 72 year old pensioner.”

A student at Goldsmiths, told Socialist Worker, “We marched down from the college and people joined us. We recognise the need to demand not just a future for students but for everyone.”

“Then they denied us access to the town hall and police attacked us, grabbing people by the hair and the neck.”

“It shows how little democracy there really is.”"

See also

Photos of the anti-cuts protest in Lewisham (Socialist Worker Online, UK)

Fracas and fury as Labour Lewisham approves cuts package (The Guardian, UK)

Students plan third and biggest education cuts protest (The Guardian, UK)

Day X2 - Next wave of student protests (Anticuts.org, UK, schedule of planned actions)

Student Protests Test U.K. Coalition Government (Wall Street Journal, New York)

Police warn students against violence (Reuters, UK)

Central Websites with updates about ongoing protests are

Anti Cuts Protest - Publicising Resistance To Tory Cuts

FeesProtest.com (lists & map of protest mini-sites, twitter feeds)

http://www.indymedia.org.uk/

Sudan's grooving Dervishes

See also the pertaining reportage of Anita McNaught and this illuminating article on contemporary civil war accountancy.

Militant protest against austerity cuts in central Berlin

26/11/2010 - More than 300 activists tried on Friday to storm or infiltrate the Parliament Square around the Berlin Reichstag where deputies had to decide about austerity cuts. Although acting in several little swarms and affinity groups (and using the so-called Five Finger Tactics practised already at the Heiligendamm G8 protests), they were violently pushed back by massive police forces in riot-gear. So they floated afterwards to the Headquarter of the ruling Christian Democrat party (CDU) which was beleaguered and harassed for some time.

Inspired by the Italian student protests the days before, some protestors employed red shields to defend themselves against the cops (photos here). According to the police two persons were arrested under the allegations of breach of public peace and infringement of disguise interdiction.

The actions around the Parliament occurred out of a demonstration of around 1,000 striking pupils and a protest march of 4,500 people, the latter organized by a reformist-left, union-near political alliance.

According to press reports the Police had mobilized around 1,700 forces, dogs without muzzle and helicopters. Before, the state had edicted a demonstration ban for the whole Parlament Square under the pretext of terror warnings.


See also

4500 protestieren in Berlin gegen Sparpaket (Indymedia Germany, with photos and links)

Demos gegen das Sparpaket: Mit der Fingertaktik an der Polizei vorbei (Der Spiegel Online, Germany, with video and photos)

A group of demonstrators tries to break through Tiergarten, a central Park, near the German Parliament

Photos:

Sven Becker / Spiegel Online (oben)

Bildagentur Frontalvision.com / Turus.net (unten)

Thousands of anarchists march in central Athens against state terrorism

From the Greek Streets, UK, posted on Friday, November 26, 2010 :

"On Thursday night, around 2,500-3,000 anarchists marched in central Athens against state terrorism and in support of the imprisoned comrades. Police presence was huge, with riot police deployed on both sides of the streets for the entire route of the demonstration. The apparent tactic, it seems, was of obstructing contact between the demonstrators and any passers-by. At the end of the demonstration, outside the Propylea of Athens university, there were scuffles with the police.

The next anarchist demonstration in central Athens has been called for December 11th. On December 6th, the anniversary march for the death of Alexis is taking place, while the 15th is the day of the next general strike."

UK and Italy again rocked by militant student protests - Portugal shut down by historic mass strike (video update Italy)

BBC reports here live from today's Student Protest in the United Kingdom. This afternoon police were kettling in thousands of student protesters who were trying to force their way into the Parlament Square in central London (the same scenes here in a very impressive video, turned on the ground, with a lot of "free speech" from pupils & students). Occupations, teach-ins and walkouts have been reported throughout the country, upon which the new center-right government of David Cameron tries to impose higher university fees and all sorts of cuts. There were violent skirmishes in London going on until night.

Occupations and walkouts across the UK against cuts (Indymedia UK)

Day X live coverage of student protests across Britain (Chronology of events from Socialist Worker, UK)

Day X: Student protests in pictures (Socialist Worker)

Pictures from Leeds student protest by Charlotte Groves (Socialist Worker)

British Students Leave Classes Over Cuts (New York Times, with photos)

More Violence Erupts At Student Protests (Sky News, UK, with several videos & photos)

Tuition fee protests turn into a riot again (Belfast Telegraph)

Student tuition fee protesters dispersed by police (BBC)

Fees demo brings chaos to streets (Harrow Observer, West London)

Student protests: School's out across the UK as children take to the streets (The Guardian, UK, with video)

Interview with an anarchist student occupier at Sheffield University (The Fargate Speaker via Libcom, UK)

Student protests: Wagner's a riot for revoltings students (Daily Star, UK)

Student protests turn ugly (ITNews Video, UK, from Youtube)

Des milliers d'étudiants manifestent à Londres (Le Figaro, France)

Handgemenge bei Studentenprotesten in London (Reuters Video via FAZ, Germany)

From Xinhua News Agency / People's Daily Online, China:

"University students on Wednesday assaulted the Italian Senate to protest against the new education reform, while hundreds of other students clashed with the police across the country.

Over 2,000 students marched up to the Senate, forced the entrance door and threw tear gases, eggs and stones at the windows, as state TV Rai reported. Police intervened to push back the students out of the parliament. Eight cops have been injured in the riots, while several students either swooned or were harmed.

Rome was blocked in a total chaos for nearly the entire day. Other groups of students staged dramatic happenings and flash mobs in front of the House, wearing ropes around their hands and necks yelling the slogan: "The government is strangling us but we will set ourselves free from its tyranny."

The students called for the government's resignation, especially that of Education Minister Maria Stella Gelmini, condemning the cuts in the education budget and the new reform aimed at increasing merit and the role of private universities.

The student blitz is the first in its kind in recent Italian history against an institutional body, quite symbolic of the current political turmoil the government is facing and the threat of an early vote.

Other students occupied Rome's central La Sapienza University, climbing on the roof of the building and shouting at who ever tried to reach them. The only MP who climbed on the roof with them in sign of solidarity was the leading opposition party secretary Pierluigi Bersani, who exploited the youth dissent in view of a government fall.

In other Italian cities, students and young researchers occupied universities, schools and institutes. In the town of Siena railways tracks were blocked for several hours in sign of protest, causing the cancellation of trains and blocking the station for hours. Also foreign students took part in the mass demonstrations.

The climate of social tensions is thus degenerating. Last time students staged such extreme mass protests was in the 1970's at the time of the global student mobilization phase."

See also

Pisa students occupy the local airport (Youtube)

Student protests in Italy against education cuts (World Socialist Web Site)

For more actual informations, see the Uniriot.org Site. Italy

Proved excellent since Roman times: the testudo or tortoise formation (Schildkrötenpanzer-Taktik)

(from Der Standard, Austria)

The Portuguese staged a massive general strike Wednesday in protest against spending cuts. It was the first joint general strike of Portugal’s two biggest unions since 1988. Like Greece, Italy, Ireland, Spain and other states, the country has recently become the target and victim of the financial markets, that is to say banks, speculators and neoliberal international institutions (European Union, European Central Bank, International Monetary Fund).

Strike paralyses Portugal, angry student protest in UK (Nine O'Clock, Romania)

Unions bring Portugal to a grinding halt as Irish-style bailout looms (The Guardian, UK)

Portuguese on general strike against austerity (Reuters via Arab News)

Portugal shut down by general strike (Libcom, UK)

Como a greve geral está a afectar o país (Jornal de negocios, Portugal, with photos)

Spain, Portugal in line for bail-out ? (AP via St. Petersburg Times, Florida)

Fears Mount Over Spain, and Risks to the Euro (New York Times)

Students protesting today during a rally on Leeds University campus, UK

(Photo by Charlotte Groves)