G20 Campaigners claim brutal police attack

According to G20 campaigners, police brutally attacked peaceful climate change campaigners in London this week, damaging tents, bicycles, and personal belongings, and leaving several protesters with injuries.

The environmental campaigners had set up a ‘climate camp’ in London to coincide with the G20 summit of world leaders.

Riot police, mounted police, police dogs, riot vans, and surveillance helicopters were used to forcibly hold peaceful campaigners around the capital within specific small areas.

This ‘kettling’ tactic involves police holding protesters within a limited area for a number of hours.

Climate camp protester Beth McGrath explains: “Despite our repeated requests to be searched and allowed to leave the space, we were held there for six hours with no access to water, food, toilets or medical care.”

Kettling is a controversial tactic both because of the manner in which people are hemmed in - which often results in injuries to protesters - and because the people within the kettle are being held against their will.

According to human rights lawyer Louise Christian, kettling is “a controversial tactic, since the police are effectively imprisoning people who may be behaving perfectly peacefully and lawfully. ”

Responding to reports of kettling, blogger Discerpo wrote: “If I wanted to stir up a crowd of peaceful demonstrators into a violent, panicking riot, I cannot think of a more effective method. How this outrageous tactic can be thought to increase public safety is beyond me. It does just the opposite.”

Police spent £7 million to police the non-violent protests around the G20 meeting in London this week.

A tiny minority of G20 protesters resorted to violence - albeit not those at climate camp. Much of the mainstream media has used this fact to overshadow the message of the peaceful protesters.

A video of police kettling in the climate camp protesters is available here.