(Reuters) - Crews cleaned up Oakland's historic City Hall on Sunday from damage inflicted overnight during violent anti-Wall Street protests that resulted in about 400 arrests, marking one of the largest mass arrests since nationwide protests began last year.
At a press conference on Sunday, Oakland police and city officials said they still had no final number for arrests in the clashes. Earlier in the day the city's emergency operations office had put the figure at around 400 people detained.
The skirmishes left three officers and at least one demonstrator injured. Two of the injured police officers were fit for duty Sunday. A third officer was off work after he was struck by a bicycle hurled by a protester and received a deep cut to the chin, police said.
Some protesters broke into City Hall and slightly damaged some contents, according to a timeline of the clashes released by Oakland police on Sunday.
Police said a group of protesters burned an American flag in front of City Hall, then entered the building and destroyed a vending machine, light fixtures and a historic scale model of city hall. The city's 911 emergency system was overwhelmed during the disturbances.
"While City Hall sustained damage, we anticipate that all City offices will be open for regular business tomorrow," said Deanna Santana, Oakland City Administrator.
Oakland has become an unlikely flashpoint of the national "Occupy" protests against economic inequality that began last year in New York's financial district and have spread to dozens of cities across the country.
The protests in most cities have been peaceful and sparked a national debate over how much of the country's wealth is held by the richest 1 percent of the population. President Barack Obama has sought to capitalize on the attention by calling for higher taxes on the richest Americans.
Occupy protests focused on Oakland after a former Marine and Iraq war veteran, Scott Olsen, was critically injured during a demonstration in October. Protesters said he was hit in the head by a tear gas canister but authorities have never said exactly how he was hurt.
The Occupy movement appeared to lose momentum late last year as police cleared protest camps in cities across the country.
Violence erupted again in Oakland on Saturday afternoon when protesters attempted to take over the apparently empty downtown convention center to establish a new headquarters and draw attention to the problem of homelessness.
Police in riot gear moved in to drive back the crowd, which they estimated at about 500 protesters.
BOTTLES, METAL PIPE
"Officers were pelted with bottles, metal pipe, rocks, spray cans, improvised explosive devices and burning flares," the Oakland Police Department said in a statement. "The Oakland Police Department deployed smoke, tear gas and beanbag projectiles in response to this activity.
Among those arrested in the melee were three journalists. The reporters, working for Mother Jones, the San Francisco Chronicle and local KGO television, were subsequently released, interim police chief Howard Jordan said.
Oakland has been struggling with a dysfunctional city administration and police department for over a decade. Police fired beanbag rounds and wooden dowel bullets at anti-war protests in 2003, which at the time was called the most violent confrontation anywhere in the country after the start of the Iraq war.
Oakland Mayor Jean Quan accused a "violent splinter group" of the Occupy movement of fomenting the Saturday protests and using the city as its playground. Protesters have accused the city of overreacting and using heavyhanded tactics.
Full story View this link: New mall in Chennai
No comments:
Post a Comment