The latest updates from whats going on in Evian

national | miscellaneous | news report Friday May 30, 2003 15:01 by path in residence - no organisation. bum at hanging dot around dot all dot day dropping concrete blocks through the windscreen of the system.. the mutha fuckn B L A N C H sixty nine

Some links for your reading pleasure.

Indymedia UK has excellent 'ticker' coverage of the current demos. http://uk.indymedia.org/

Thursday's demo attracted about 5,000 people (in the cold hail & rain) which was mostly pink+sliver and black blocs. There was some tear gas and stones exchanged between the cops and crowd but nothing too hectic.

Today's demos have about the same number of people, started earlier in the day. There was some property damage at the WTO and the IOM headquarters. Some tear gas.

Reports say that thousands of people are arriving into the villages now. But numbers are definitely going to be down on Genoa.

ATTAC have already started condemning fellow protesters. Whatever their views on property damage its hardly right of them to say that people who engage in it are not part of 'the movement'. Black Bloc is just as much a tactic as their campaign for "tax reform" (and the effectiveness of that as solving the worlds problems is another day's argument entirely) and they should accept this if not agree with it. And it will always be there.

From the Financial Times website: "Those involved in vandalism or violence will be condemned in advance, they are not part of the alternative world movement," says Jacques Nikonoff, president of the anti-globalisation group Attac.

There's an interesting article here for a call for violent direct action: http://uk.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=69997&group=webcast

There's also been a call for an 'Aqua' block in Evian which would fall somewhere between the pinks and blacks. Those in favour of non-violent direct action. That term is always a bit vague to my ears but I guess they mean blockades and invasions I suppose.

The UK site Evian coverage:
http://uk.indymedia.org/archive/features/current

The Global IMC site:
http://www.indymedia.org/g8/en/

Good luck to the Good Bus people who have been there since Monday, and the Socialist Worker bus people who I think are leaving today some time.