Anti-Olympic forces plan 'massive disruption' of opening ceremonies (corporate media)

Anti-Olympic activists plan massive disruption on opening day of Vancouver Olympics
By Ian MacLeod , The Province/Canwest News Service, February 5, 2010
http://www.theprovince.com/sports/2010wintergames/sports/2010wintergames...

OTTAWA — A call has gone out for anti-Olympic activists from across the continent to clog the streets of Vancouver and disrupt the first full day of the Winter Games.

Details of the planned Feb. 13 street march, called “2010 Heart Attack: clog the arteries of Capitalism,” appeared Friday on InfoShop News, a U.S.-based anarchist web site and Vancouver’s Olympic Resistance Network site.

“Several anti-capitalist, anti-colonial groups and individuals are organizing a demonstration respecting the diversity of tactics,” it announced.

“We expect your group to have a collective position on how confrontational you want to be during the demonstration. We also expect that discussion or proposal of illegal acts remains between comrades and affinity groups in order to keep everyone safe.”

The planned march will take place outside a designated area near the Pacific Coliseum for protesters to assemble. Police say the site and other “safe assembly areas” are not meant to stifle dissent, but rather to provide areas where protest is possible.

The online call to action urges protesters to support, “each others’ chosen method of resistance while not threatening the lives of those around us. It is a way by which we hope to create space for the realization of tension, uncertainty, action, humour and beauty as we strive for new ways to engage with each other and against a common enemy.

“As participants we agree to leave the policing of tactics to our oppressors, not our comrades; we will not attack each other for using methods that are not our own. Through a diversity of tactics we are stronger and more cohesive towards our goal of giving Capitalism a massive coronary.”

Organizers could not be reached to elaborate.

The march is to coincide with the first “autonomous day of action,” sponsored by the Olympic Resistance Network, which bills the events as, “action including anti-corporate actions, rallies to oppose militarization and more.”

“People are expecting trouble from the police, this is not specific to the 13th, but for all the actions that have been called,” said Harjap Grewal, a network member. “The police have never dealt with a situation where they’re actually doing security against a mass demonstration at an Olympic Games. They’ve done this at the WTO and the Free Trade Area of the Americas meetings, where they can basically set up a police line around one venue and they’re OK.

“But they’re dealing with 50,000 tourists and a city that’s going to have all sorts of things going on.” he said. “People are curious about what’s going to happen, but there’s always more of a concern in these situations about what the police action is going to be then what the protesters’ actions are.”

For months now, a loose coalition of anti-Olympic, anti-global, anti-poverty and anti-capitalists have been organizing protests to take place at the Games, always a favourite backdrop for demonstrators. Olympic security is responding with more than 15,000 police, military and private security guards and a total security budget of $900 million.

The only violence over the past two years has come from rebels who have claimed direct action against upward of 50 windows at nationwide branches of RBC, a chief sponsor of the Games.

Meanwhile, the risk of terrorism or other attacks aimed at disrupting the Olympics in Vancouver remains at a low level, the head of security for the Vancouver Olympics said this week.

As for smaller threats to the Games from the Olympic Resistance Network and others, Assistant RCMP Commissioner Bud Mercer said no citizen would be allowed to disrupt the Games in a way that breaks the law.

“Everyone has the right to enjoy the Games ...,” he said. “Not just the Olympic Resistance Network.”
Ottawa Citizen