Great news from the courts today (17 Feb) where 11 out of the 13 Crumlin water charge protesters arrested last year have had their cases dismissed. Although 2 are still to face trial in May this is a victory not just because 11 are already off but because the judge seems to have smacked down the Garda attempts to interpret the Public Order Act in a way that would outlaw a lot of protest. This is a significant slap down for the political policing pushed as a strategy by the Labour Party & Fine Gael to try and demoralise the water charges movement.
Specialist topics: Policing
This video shows some of the violent eviction of a house on Phibsboro Avenue in Dublin during which the inhabitants were pepper sprayed and arrested on a ridiculous burglary charge. They had been living in the house two months and were of course later released without charge.
A large number of Garda made arrests towards the end of a pro-choice rally in Dublin this evening. Three pro-choice campaigners were arrested, at least one of them was pepper sprayed when they were already on the ground.
Demonstrations took place overnight (15 Dec 2014) across the Spanish state against the series of police raids targeting the anarchist movement. The Barcelona demonstration of 2000 people was led by a banner proclaiming "If you touch one; you touch all"
Demands include "Freedom for those arrested for struggling" "Down with prison walls" and "Social war against the state of capital"
Over 200 women demonstrated tonight (mid Nov ) outside of Coolock Garda station against the wave of Garda violence at water meter installation protests.
The water meter installation company GMC Sierra obtained court injunctions that basically banned water charge campaigners from coming within 20m of an installation. The Edenmore 9 were initally brought to court with this injunction, the case againt 4 of them is detailed below.
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Statement on the Jobstown brick
After weeks of Garda provocation, and just after Garda beat protesters with batons someone finally snapped and threw a single brick back. When a politician as unpopular as Joan Burton uses dozens of riot police to force her way into and out of one of the most deprived communities in the state, what should be expected but angry protest. And when at a moment of unprecedented popular mobilisation those same Garda pull pepper spray & batons for use against water charge resistors what is a single brick bouncing off a car in response.
Running scared from the huge numbers mobilising to resist the water charge the establishment are now pulling out all the stops. Over the weekend we saw an image of a single brick being thrown at a Garda car used to try and divide the movement through saturation coverage of the brick and the demand that resistors condemn ‘violence’
There were significant disturbances in Santry & Coolock last night following a Garda assault on water charge campaigners protesting a visit by Enda Kenny and Denis O’Brien.
These images are from the video at the link which shows why the campaigners became so outraged. As Enda Kenny drove through the crowd (flashing a dismissive thumbs up sign at the protesters) Garda were assaulting them and throwing them to the ground.
Following increasing Garda suppression of community resistance to water meters tens of thousands of people took part in a march against the water tax in Dublin on October 11th. This was the largest demonstration since 2010 and reflects a broad rejection of the way the costs of the capitalist crisis continue to be imposed on ordinary workers. The huge size of the demonstration certainly suggest a mass boycott of the tax could make it impossible to implement, as was the case in the last attempt to introduce a water tax.