wrote on 25 April 2009 17:00:10 ...
On Apr 24, 10:26 pm, "Richard J." wrote:
Offramp wrote on 23 April 2009 11:32:10 ...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/video/2...ri-lanka-tamil
"Tamil protesters clash with police
Thousands of protesters take to the streets of London to demonstrate
against the treatment of Tamils in Sri Lanka"
I repeat, it is the police who close the streets.

That video shows the police trying to get people off the road; but
they keep jumping back in.
Why don't they protest at the Sri Lankan embassy?

It's been interesting reading this thread in Paris, where Tamil
protesters have also been active. They tried a sit-in here last Monday
at a major road junction in the evening peak, then took to smashing
windows of buildings and buses after the police moved them off the road.
In London you usually get a few arrests from this sort of thing, and
most of them get released without charge. The press here in Paris
called it merely a "mini-riot", so I wasn't expecting to hear any more
about it.

But 210 were arrested, 147 of whom were still in custody ater 48 hours.
This morning (Friday), I read that 88 protesters had been charged; two
accused of deliberate violence towards the police would stand trial
immediately, a further 16 in June and 68 others in September; all of
them are banned from attending any demonstrations meanwhile. I guess
that arrests on that scale would be defeated by the paperwork in Britain.

I think you'll find the paperwork in France, and indeed most developed
countries, is equivalent to the paperwork in .uk.

Interesting, though: clearly dark-skinned non-Frogs are subject to
harsher riot-related rules than the average homme-dans-la-rue.

No, the problem was the lack of prior police authorisation of the demo.
Normally (and the Tamils do this as well), the march or whatever is
agreed in advance, police stop the traffic, buses are diverted or
stopped short (with notices posted on bus stops the previous day),
street sweeping gangs bring up the rear to clear the litter away after
the march -- all very organised. But if the demonstrators don't get
authorisation, then they're fair game for the police.

--
Richard J.
(to email me, swap 'uk' and 'yon' in address)