Riot police fired rubber bullets and used long batons, plastic shields, concussion grenades and stun guns in clashes with hundreds of demonstrators protesting talks aimed at creating a hemisphere-wide free-trade zone.
It was not immediately known how many people were injured. Some journalists were among the hurt, struck by thrown debris or rubber bullets. Miami police said two officers were injured.
At one hospital, 12 demonstrators and three police officers were treated for injuries, Jackson Memorial Hospital spokeswoman Lorraine Nelson said.
PHOTO: AP
About 140 arrests were made on Thursday on charges such as obstruction, battery, aggravated assault, unlawful assembly, resisting arrest, trespassing and burglary, bringing the arrest total for the week to about 150, said Stephen Thompson, a Miami-Dade Corrections Officer at the FTAA Miami Unified Command Center.
Alonzo Mendez was bleeding from an abrasion he said was caused when a rubber bullet hit him in the chest.
"I was just taking pictures and they fired at me," he said.
Thursday's clashes occurred before and after a peaceful march organized by the US labor unions, which are also opposed to the proposed Free Trade Area of the Americas.
An estimated 8,000 to 10,000 marchers took part, saying the 34-nation FTAA would take thousands of US jobs to other countries, reduce workers' rights by exploiting cheap labor and drain natural resources.
Soon after the march, several dozen protesters resumed battling with police, pushing up against police lines and throwing water bottles, colored flares and rocks at officers. Police fired tear gas and rubber bullets at the demonstrators after the protesters set small trash fires in the street and used slingshots to fire projectiles at officers.
The afternoon battle appeared more violent and chaotic than the morning clashes, when at least 1,000 protesters -- many wearing bandannas across the bottom half of their faces, surgical masks and blue baseball helmets -- battled with officers who used their batons to push the demonstrators back.
Despite the clashes, most of the protesters were peaceful, carrying puppets, holding signs and chanting, "This is what a police state looks like."
Beating on an African drum, Joshua Xander, 21, of Cincinnati, said the police are "totally doing what they feel necessary. We are doing what we think is necessary -- conflict of interests."
Police set up a perimeter around the protesters, marching toward them in waves and firing rubber bullets to force them back.
"As the level of confrontation escalated, so did the level of presence by our police officers," police spokesman Jorge Pino said. "We are employing different kinds of techniques ... and are willing and able to take whatever action is necessary to keep the city and our community safe."
The morning clashes delayed the start of the AFL-CIO's march, and its leaders complained that police were preventing buses carrying marchers, some of them elderly, from reaching the staging area.
"Everybody is just letting their feelings known in a peaceful way," said William Vargas, one of 800 union parade marshals who helped keep the peace.
The unions' protest included huge puppets of dolphins and sunflowers, people walking on stilts and many chanting slogans such as "Just Say No Way to George Bush's FTAA."
Bob Wessell, a 49-year-old steel worker from Indiana, said his job making hospital beds may be lost because of cheaper manufacturing in China.
"I am here to save American jobs and make the world a safer place to live," Wessell said.
DEADLOCK: Putin has vowed to continue fighting unless Ukraine cedes more land, while talks have been paused with no immediate results expected, the Kremlin said Russia on Friday said that peace talks with Kyiv were on “pause” as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy warned that Russian President Vladimir Putin still wanted to capture the whole of Ukraine. Meanwhile, US President Donald Trump said that he was running out of patience with Putin, and the NATO alliance said it would bolster its eastern front after Russian drones were shot down in Polish airspace this week. The latest blow to faltering diplomacy came as Russia’s army staged major military drills with its key ally Belarus. Despite Trump forcing the warring sides to hold direct talks and hosting Putin in Alaska, there
North Korea has executed people for watching or distributing foreign television shows, including popular South Korean dramas, as part of an intensifying crackdown on personal freedoms, a UN human rights report said on Friday. Surveillance has grown more pervasive since 2014 with the help of new technologies, while punishments have become harsher — including the introduction of the death penalty for offences such as sharing foreign TV dramas, the report said. The curbs make North Korea the most restrictive country in the world, said the 14-page UN report, which was based on interviews with more than 300 witnesses and victims who had
COMFORT WOMEN CLASH: Japan has strongly rejected South Korean court rulings ordering the government to provide reparations to Korean victims of sexual slavery The Japanese government yesterday defended its stance on wartime sexual slavery and described South Korean court rulings ordering Japanese compensation as violations of international law, after UN investigators criticized Tokyo for failing to ensure truth-finding and reparations for the victims. In its own response to UN human rights rapporteurs, South Korea called on Japan to “squarely face up to our painful history” and cited how Tokyo’s refusal to comply with court orders have denied the victims payment. The statements underscored how the two Asian US allies still hold key differences on the issue, even as they pause their on-and-off disputes over historical
CONSOLIDATION: The Indonesian president has used the moment to replace figures from former president Jokowi’s tenure with loyal allies In removing Indonesia’s finance minister and U-turning on protester demands, the leader of Southeast Asia’s biggest economy is scrambling to restore public trust while seizing a chance to install loyalists after deadly riots last month, experts say. Demonstrations that were sparked by low wages, unemployment and anger over lawmakers’ lavish perks grew after footage spread of a paramilitary police vehicle running over a delivery motorcycle driver. The ensuing riots, which rights groups say left at least 10 dead and hundreds detained, were the biggest of Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto’s term, and the ex-general is now calling on the public to restore their
RSS