Top Olympic Cop Warns of 'Criminal Protests'

Olympic security police stepped up their 'psychological warfare' against Olympic resistance with a sensationalistic presentation to Vancouver city council on July 7, 2009. Although he didn't mention No2010.com by name, we know the website he refers to is yours truly. All this talk about Molotov cocktails is making us thirsty... Included for your entertainment are corporate media articles on his presentation to city council.

Olympic security force of 16,500 prepares

By Damian Inwood, The Province/Canwest News Service, July 8, 2009

Local, national and international groups are planning “criminal protests”
during the Vancouver 2010 Olympics, says the Games’ top cop.

And RCMP assistant commissioner Bud Mercer, head of the Vancouver 2010
Integrated Security Unit, raised the spectre Tuesday of the violent
clashes that rocked World Trade Organization meetings in Seattle and
Quebec City.

“I can assure council as I stand before you here today, that locally,
provincially, nationally and internationally, there are groups that are
considering or planning to engage in criminal protests during the 2010
Games,” Mercer told Vancouver city council.

“North America and Canada is not a stranger to criminal protests during
major events — the 1999 Seattle WTO, 2001 in Quebec City or the Stanley
Cup riot. There are things that will happen during a major event that we
have a responsibility to plan and prepare for.”

Later Mercer said his definition of “criminal protests” included “violent
protests, mass people throwing Molotov cocktails, breaking fences,
permanently blocking highways, refusing to leave, damaging property,
assaults, throwing things, injuring people. The list goes on.” Mercer told
council 2010 security plans include:

- More than 900 cameras to guard the perimeters of Olympic venues.

- “Free speech” zones where protesters can legally demonstrate.

- A 2010 security force of 7,000 police, 5,000 private security officers
and 4,500 members of the Canadian Armed Forces.

Mercer said that in 10 minutes surfing anti-2010 Games sites on the
Internet, he came up with pictures and pamphlets showing:

- Olympic mascots carrying Molotov cocktails.

- The Olympic rings with Nazi swastikas.

- Masked protesters, tires burning, blocking a highway, an enhanced photo
showing the CPR’s Olympic torch “Spirit Train” being pushed off the
tracks, an image of a beheading with the words, “Elementary to the art of
war, cut off the head and the body will die” and a banner reading, “Riot
2010,” taken at a rally in Chinatown in November.

“If I found this kind of thing on a website, it deserves a conversation
between my staff and the people that would have put this on the website,
to determine what their intentions are,” Mercer said.

“With those that are engaged or wish to engage in lawful protest, we’ll do
our very best to make contact and engage in discussion with them.

“With those individuals who are planning to engage in violent or criminal
protest, they’ll maintain my interest and I would suggest the Canadian
public would expect me to do nothing but that.”

He said peaceful, legal protests are no problem but people using protest
signs as a weapon are committing an offence.

Vancouver Deputy Police Chief Steve Sweeney said that between 50 and 70
surveillance cameras will be used at Vancouver celebration live sites,
along pedestrian corridors and in the Granville Street entertainment
district.

He said a small number of homeless people who live close to downtown
Olympic venues will be “relocated.”

Chris Shaw of 2010 Watch said he felt intimidated when he was approached
by 2010 police officers a few weeks ago.

“I think there may be people who want to use protest zones,” he said.

“The rest of the people will take the view that the whole of Canada is a
free speech zone and they will protest wherever they think they need to,
to exercise their Charter rights.”

E-mail: dinwood@theprovince.com

2010 cop plans at council

By BOB MACKIN, 24 HOURS

Call it Bud Mercer's protest horror picture show.

The chief operating officer of the RCMP-led Vancouver 2010 Integrated
Security Unit showed council Monday several images he found on
anti-Olympic websites, including a stylized Riot 2010 slogan and the
famous photo of three masked people in front of the Olympic flag stolen
from city hall in 2007. He said his officers want to talk with the
creators to determine whether they will cause mayhem during the Winter
Olympics.

"North America is not a stranger to criminal protests during events,"
Mercer said.

He said plainclothes police were within their rights to approach Olympics
foes in January and June because "discussion is a two-way street."

2010 Watch's Chris Shaw called Mercer's display "ridiculous" and said
V2010 ISU should hold a public forum with Olympics foes instead of
approaching them in a clandestine manner.

Mercer said 16,500 police, security guards and military personnel would
patrol Metro Vancouver and Seat to Sky from Jan. 23 to March 24. He would
not comment on voluntary protest zones planned near the Vancouver Olympic
and Paralympic Centre, Pacific Coliseum or Thunderbird Arena.

Police defend security plans for 2010 Games
Tue Jul 7, 2009

VANCOUVER, British Columbia (Reuters) - Heavy security planned for next
year's Winter Olympics in Vancouver is justified by the threat of criminal
protests, the head of the Games security unit said on Tuesday.

Bud Mercer, assistant commissioner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police,
also denied allegations by some anti-Olympic groups that they have been
harassed by police looking to get information on what they are planning to
do during the 17-day event in February.

"There are groups that are considering or planning to engage in criminal
protesting during the 2010 Games," Mercer told Vancouver's city council.

The Canadian government has budgeted C$900 million ($776 million) for
security during the Games in Vancouver and the nearby mountain resort
community of Whistler. The planned force includes 7,000 police, 4,500
troops and 5,000 private security guards.

The event in February 2010 is expected to bring 5,000 athletes and
officials, more than 10,000 media representatives and 1.6 million ticket
holders to the area on Canada's Pacific Coast. It will be followed almost
immediately by the smaller 2010 Winter Paralympics.

The only public threat to the Olympics has come from a small group of
activists who complain the Games will displace Vancouver's homeless and
will be conducted on land taken from native Indians when Canada was
founded as a country.

Mercer said his own personal survey of the Internet found scores of
graphic and written items that appear to pose a criminal threat to the
Games, adding they would concern "the average Canadian."

At least one city councilor said she questioned if Mercer was
over-reacting to some of the images and said she was concerned about
police tactics.

Mercer said he had no problem with legal demonstrations during the event,
and promised that police would obey Canada's Charter of Rights and
Freedoms.

Some civil rights activists have expressed concern about the planned
security as well as reports of undercover police agents trying to solicit
information from groups opposed to the Olympics.

"Nothing can be further from the truth," Mercer told city council.

Police officials said they have attempted to "reach out" to groups
expected to protest during the Games, and understood they have a right not
to talk to police. Police say they will set aside legal protest zones in
the city.

Mercer said security planning has been complicated somewhat by Vancouver's
coastal geography and the fact that the air space that needs to be watched
closely during the Games extends over the United States.

Security chief warns of planned 'criminal' protests

ROD MICKLEBURGH

VANCOUVER — From Wednesday's Globe and Mail Last updated on Wednesday,
Jul. 08, 2009 10:13AM EDT

Groups from across Canada and around the world are planning criminal
protests during the 2010 Winter Olympics, the head of Games security
warned yesterday.

In a presentation to Vancouver city council, RCMP Assistant Commissioner
Bud Mercer said that just a few days of searching on the Internet
uncovered depictions of Olympic mascots with Molotov cocktails, masked
protesters, blood running off the Olympic rings, banners reading "Riot
2010," a comment to the effect: "if you cut off the head, the body will
die," and masked individuals standing in front of "stolen property" (a
pilfered Olympic flag from City Hall).

"Locally, provincially, nationally and internationally, there are groups
considering and planning to engage in criminal protest at the Olympics,"
said Assistant Commissioner Mercer, head of the 2010 Integrated Security
Unit (ISU).

As he outlined the alleged threat, someone in the public galleries
shouted: "Bullshit"

The ISU chief contended the prospect of "violent, criminal activities"
justified recent controversial police tactics of approaching activists at
their homes, workplaces and on the street to talk to them about their
plans for the Olympics.

"We have to make contact, dialogue and speak to these groups. If they
choose not to talk to us, that's their right," he said. "But police also
have a right in Canada to approach people ... to determine their
intentions."

Councillor Ellen Woodsworth suggested the Internet material found by
Assistant Commissioner Mercer consisted mostly of crude cartoons and
hardly suggested a viable threat. "I'm concerned you're holding them up as
examples of criminal behaviour," she told him.

"I don't agree," he responded. "[The material] certainly deserves a
conversation between myself and those people. ... I think Canadians would
want us to do that."

However, there will be no restrictions against lawful, peaceful protests,
he insisted. In fact, police hope to establish "free-speech areas" near
Olympic venues for those who want to express their opposition to the
Games.

But, unlike such zones at the Beijing Olympics last year, protesters will
not be required to use them. Afterward, prominent anti-Olympic spokesman
Chris Shaw said he is not much interested in using police-designated
protest zones. "There may be some who want to go there, but for the rest
of the people, all of Canada is a free-speech zone."

He said he is relieved by Assistant Commissioner Mercer's assurance that
protests will not be restricted to such zones. "I'm delighted to hear
that, and we will hold him to his word."

But he criticized the security chief's warning about the potential for
criminal protest activities at the Olympics. "He is cherry-picking that
material [from the Internet] to justify police taking all their actions."