The International Monetary Fund stepped up its warning about the danger of violence at its annual meeting to be held later this month, blaming protest organizers for what it called a "serious security threat."
The finance ministers and bankers who will gather in Washington to discuss issues such as the world economy and concern about a possible Argentine default must take precautions to ensure their safety, IMF spokesman Thomas Dawson said on Friday.
"There is quite clearly a serious security threat," Dawson said. "There really are quite a few indications that people are planning activities that do not fit in the peaceful category."
In one sign of that threat, George Washington University, which is near the IMF and World Bank headquarters, said it will shut down for four days during the meetings, at the urging of the police. The university said it will evacuate students from dormitories for that period.
Police say they expect as many as 100,000 protesters on the streets, and are considering closing off dozens of city blocks to keep the demonstrators away from the meeting sites.
The IMF and World Bank already scaled back their meetings to two days, Sept. 29 and 30, and canceled a series of seminars with bankers and investors.
The protesters are calling on the IMF and bank to cancel all the debt owed by the world's poorest countries, stop forcing developing nations to open their markets to trade and investment and ease lending conditions that they say hurt the poor, among other complaints.
The IMF guides the economies of dozens of developing nations through its conditional loan programs, often pressing governments to balance their books by cutting spending and promoting trade.
The fund's recent meetings have been dogged by protesters.
At the IMF gathering a year ago in Prague, demonstrators ripped cobblestones from the streets and hurled them at police, spray-painted historic buildings, smashed cars, constructed barricades and set fires. More than 70 people were injured and 600 arrested.
Most of the protesters did not engage in violence, and some of the largest groups such as Jubilee 2000 and Oxfam criticized the actions.
At the IMF meeting in Washington in April 2000, more than 1,300 people were arrested, although the organizers said none were convicted of any crimes.
This time around, Washington police are soliciting the help of thousands of police from New York, Philadelphia and other cities.
Dawson, pressed for any indication the Washington protesters will engage in violence again, displayed a photograph of one of the organizers, Robert Naiman, after he had thrown a pie at then-IMF Managing Director Michel Camdessus in Bangkok in early 2000.
Naiman and others organizing the events against the IMF and World Bank say they want to hold a peaceful gathering.
"From the standpoint of these institutions, anything that isn't on their script is violence," Naiman said today. And while he said he has promised his mother he'll never toss a pie again, he dismissed the action as an example of violent protest.
"When you say the word violence to me, I think of someone being hurt," Naiman said. "I don't think anyone would suggest that I was trying to hurt Camdessus."
Naiman and other IMF critics say the institution is trying to shift the focus away from its work with developing countries, which they say hurt the poor.
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