[Reformatted] Burning down the olympics

[A. Melon]

mv at cdc.gov (Major Variola ret) writes:

> Tuesday January 08 09:52 PM EST
> http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/abc/20020108/ts/olympicprotesters020108_1.html
>
>  Olympics Officials Keep Eyes on Protesters
>
>  By Geraldine Sealey ABCNEWS.com
>
>  Security plan for terrorists and protesters.
>
> Security for the Salt Lake City Olympics, with a price tag exceeding
> $300 million, was a top priority even before Sept. 11. But
> international terrorism isn't the only threat: Officials are bracing
> for a potential record number of protesters and that some might take
> advantage of the world stage to make mayhem.
>
> While Olympics and city officials say they have no evidence of unruly
> demonstrations planned for the 17-day Games set to begin on Feb. 8,
> they are preparing for them. About 1 million visitors from around the
> world are expected to descend on the city next month along with an
> undetermined number of demonstrators.
>
> One official strategy for controlling demonstrations seems to be
> accommodating peaceful protesters as much as possible. So many
> demonstrators want to come to Salt Lake City to support their causes
> that officials are providing demonstrators seven official protest
> zones believed to be a first for the Games. The city is also issuing
> official permits for groups that want to protest in Salt Lake City
> during the games.
>
> By providing safe zones where demonstrators can exercise their free
> speech rights, city and Olympic officials are hoping to prevent the
> kind of violent and disorderly protests that have marred such recent
> international events as the 1999 World Trade Organization (news - web
> sites) meetings in Seattle or last year's G8 summit in Genoa, Italy.
>
> Mapping out protest zones and certifying legitimate Olympic
> demonstrators is helping the Games organizers keep tabs on who is
> showing up, officials say. The organizers clearly have learned lessons
> from recent violent demonstrations. They're also tuned in to radical
> environmental and animal rights activists, active in Utah, who have
> turned to violence in recent years to spread their message.
>
> "The demonstrations that have gotten out of hand like at the WTO seem
> to be a fairly recent phenomenon that we want to be prepared for,"
> said Josh Ewing, a spokesman for Salt Lake City.
>
> Not All Protesters Created Equal
>
> In the new era of globally organized protesters and violence-prone
> anarchists, not all protesters are created equal. The protest groups
> who have signed up for permits to set up camp near the Olympic events
> are peaceful groups and are not expected to incite unrest.
>
> "[Games planners] are preparing for the worst, but animal rights have
> the intention of organizing non-violent protests," said Sean Diener,
> director of the Utah Animal Rights Coalition, which is helping to
> organize protests against the Olympics-sponsored Rodeo. "We have no
> expectation for anything to turn out like the things in Genoa or
> Seattle. There will be non-violent but effective protests," he said.
>
> As of late last week, 10 groups had received official protest permits
> from the city, including homeless activists, supporters of the banned
> Chinese spiritual sect Falun Gong (news - web sites), disabled rights
> advocates, and a church group critical of gay rights.
>
> Even though Olympics protests so far are expected to be peaceful,
> security officials are concerned that demonstrators interested in
> violence or general lawlessness could infiltrate those protesters who
> are coordinating their efforts with the city and Olympic officials.
>
> Officials have investigated the Web site of a group called Build
> Underground Resistance Not the Olympics, which claims to be devoted
> to agitating and educating demonstrators for the Games. The site
> reads: "BURN the Olympics has been initiated by radicals who are not
> resigned to sit back and watch our city turn into a playground for the
> rich. We plan on using our diverse skills and tactics to tackle the
> multinational death machine that is killing the planet."
>
> BURN says the Olympics are too corporate, too money-driven, advance
> globalization and nationalism, and ruin the environment. Another
> group, Citizens Activist Network, is also opposed to the Olympics on
> similar grounds, but has signed up for a legal permit to protest in an
> official zone, where BURN has not. A spokeswoman for BURN, who only
> goes by the name of "Sabrina," said her group would not apply for a
> permit because by doing so, "we would be recognizing the authority of
> the state to grant or deny freedom of speech."
>
> Intelligence Operation Against Anarchist Infiltration
>
> Further, she said, many globalization protesters would likely
> demonstrate at a meeting of G8 finance ministers scheduled for Feb.
> 8 and 9 in Ottawa, and so turnout among globalization protesters is
> not likely to be comparable at the Olympics as at other international
> events.
>
> It is difficult to tell how many demonstrators the BURN group
> legitimately represents. Salt Lake City officials believe the
> BURN site might only be run by the spokeswoman, with no extensive
> organization backing it. But still, officials are preparing for
> anything.
>
> To head off violent protests, law enforcement agencies have conducted
> years-long intelligence operations in an attempt to figure out whether
> potentially disruptive groups are headed to Salt Lake City.
>
> The security effort also will include handing our educational
> pamphlets to protesters with permits to warn them about the
> possibility that radical activists who would incite violence could
> infiltrate their ranks.
>
> While officials are doing everything in their power to allow
> demonstrators to have a voice during the Games, "People have been
> oblivious to other people infiltrating them and it's gotten nasty,"
> Ewing said.
>
> Olympics planners will warn demonstrators that if police ask them to
> disperse for any reason and they do not, protesters will be arrested.
>
> Hoping for Crowd Control
>
> Stephen Clark, legal director of the Utah chapter of the American
> Civil Liberties Union (news - web sites), said he hopes security
> officials have learned how to control crowds more efficiently after
> past clashes with demonstrators got ugly.
>
> "There seems to have been two models: Seattle, where there seemed to
> be a total lack of preparation, and then the other extreme is the
> Republican convention in Philadelphia in 2000," he said, "where police
> seemed to apply a program of preventive detention by rounding up usual
> suspects and placing them in jail with million-dollar bails so people
> couldn't cause chaos for the convention.
>
> "I hope the organizers have appropriately planned for spontaneous
> protests, or even people who might want to cause mischief, and not
> overreact."
>
> The threat of violence at the Olympics is not a new phenomenon, of
> course. At the 1996 Atlanta Games, the bombing in Centennial Park
> killed 1 and injured 111, reminding Olympic organizers how vulnerable
> the Games could be.
>
> Terrorism also struck the Olympics in Munich in 1972 when 11 Israeli
> athletes were killed by Palestinian gunmen.