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Anarchists seize building for demo HQ
Jack Lefley and Danny Brierley1 Apr 2009
THE battle for control of the City was under way today as anarchists seized a building in the heart of the capital to use as a base for G20 protests.
Hooded and masked men unfurled a black flag from the roof of the disused office block.
Scores of protesters from around the world occupied the building to prepare for today's protests.
Police sources said the group included "known" troublemakers who had been seen at other demonstrations, including the violent Gaza rallies outside the Israeli embassy in January.
The three-storey building in Earl Street is a short distance from Liverpool Street and Moorgate railway stations, two of the starting points for today's marches on the Bank of England.
Organisers later held a meeting inside to hand out duties before protesters left the block in small groups on reconnaissance missions.
Protesters were sent out, often on bikes, to search skips for furniture or to buy food and water. Individuals who appeared at windows or on the roof with their faces covered said they were not allied to a particular group.
Many, including a 21-year-old who called herself Minnie Mouse Zombie, were from comfortable backgrounds. Describing herself as an artist and the daughter of an NHS psychiatric nurse and a counsellor, she said: "My background has given me a platform and made me more able to get involved with things like this. If I was working in a factory for 12 hours a day for a pittance I would be too tired to protest. I am totally middle class, there is no point being guilty about it."
The building was advertised on social messaging site Twitter and G20 protest forums as a "convergence space".
Notices were put up in the windows warning police and landlords that the building was occupied at all times and any attempt to enter it would be a "criminal offence".
Police made three arrests but they were not able to prevent the building's occupation and stood by as protesters filed in. However, they did make three arrests. One was a woman held for carrying a knife. As she was led to a waiting police van she said: "I've been arrested for having a knife to sharpen my make-up with."
A Scotland Yard spokesman said officers had been monitoring "open source" information such as the websites used by anarchists.
He added: "If people are breaking the law we will act."
Reader views (17)
Then maybe the law should be changed coz it's unbelievable and unjust that squatters got more rights than law-obeying citizens.
- Brandino, London, 01/04/2009 15:37
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I can't stand the crusties but the idea that City workers provide the tax revenues to run the country... someone is soon going to call the City workers "wealth creators" as all the City people called themselves for years. We all have paid for their mistakes and the mistakes of successive governments. If the City workers were paid minimum wage to spray soapy water at the crusties from water cannons then this would be poetic justice all around.
- Saunaing Tic Gill, London, 01/04/2009 15:23
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Er, let's not forget that the City casino has collapsed, after gambling with our ordinary deposits, and we have all had to rescue it.
If investment banks had just played with their own money, there would not be tens of millions thrown out of work worldwide, and millions pushed back into poverty in the less developed countries.
Just because you work hard in the City, doesn't mean all of you do anything useful. Markets for capital are supposed to benefit efficient business, and close down the inefficient, and they do. But much of the City is just about gambling with our money.
- Jay, London, 01/04/2009 14:55
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These chippy, loud-mouthed protestors should do something useful for society instead of jumping on the nearest lefty bandwagon. I don't see them rioting against the grotesquely obese public sector which consumes more and more of our wages. Ironically, City workers (and the rest of us) provide the tax revenues which keep these so-called 'anarchists' in benefits. Haskey and Robert are right - the rest of us struggle to afford a mortgage or rent so why should these layabouts be allowed to squat? Brainless politicians indeed.
- Monkeytrousers, Slough, UK, 01/04/2009 13:46
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I agree with Haskey what a nonsense, unless they are paying rent they should be arrested.
- Dave, Madrid, 01/04/2009 13:45
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Is Haskey suggesting that the police have the right to break the law? Many lawyers have made fortunes out of police forces, by getting damages on behalf of people whose rights the police have trampled on. So in fact Haskey is suggesting that my taxes be raised. No thanks.
- Mistertea, London, 01/04/2009 13:15
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To the factory workers in Bury St Edmonds, I agree with your sentiments, and funnily enough, we were saying here that once the demo is over, some of the protesters will be disappearing on Daddies yaught, for champers and cucumber sandwiches.
- Malc, London,England, 01/04/2009 12:50
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If I were the landlord, apart from starting proceedings to get the squatters out, I would write to the Council advising them that the building has been squatted. Legally the squatters are liable for the rates on the property and then, providing the squatters are there for at least 6 weeks, when they are eventually evicted, the landlord will get a further 3 months without paying the penal empty rates that the Government charge on all empty properties
- Robert, London, 01/04/2009 12:28
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What society have our brainless politicians created? Police unable to enter an empty building to evict trouble makers, in case it is a "criminal offence"?
What a load tosh. No wonder the country's in the state it's in!
- Haskey, London SE1, 01/04/2009 12:18
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Only cowards keep their faces covered. And the so-called middle class 21 yr old female child "protester" could obviously do with some treatment from her own mother (a psychiatric nurse).
- Annabelle, london, 01/04/2009 12:05
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Well what a surprise, one of the so called ‘anarchists’ turns out to be a very middle class champagne socialist. I work in a factory and there is nothing more patronizing than someone like her thinking she has the right to speak for me. The reason I am not at today’s protest is because I don’t want to be surrounded by a bunch of pathetic, predictable rich kid champagne socialists who think their rebellious if they grow some dreadlocks.
- Factory Workers Vote Tory, Bury St Edmunds, 01/04/2009 11:51
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How clever these people are, occupying an unoccupied building.
- Mrs Bird, London, 01/04/2009 11:50
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so a "disused office block" is hardly "seizing", is it? Not like there was anyone there to defend it?
- Marianne, SW France, 01/04/2009 11:49
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"A knife to sharpen her make up with", what a load of tosh. Us working classes use pencil sharpeners,and I mean 'working' classes. Stick a bomb under the lot of them and you wouldn't do five bobs worth of damage!
- Sue, Orpington, Kent, 01/04/2009 11:31
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Perhaps the police should wait until they're all inside, then lock the doors - sorted!
- Ian, Surbiton, 01/04/2009 11:28
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Imagine the great contributions these people could make to society (and to their own future) by turning their organisational skills and efforts towards doing something constructive rather than destructive! And if they hate capitalism so much, there are plenty of places their labour's would benefit others such as care work etc that wouldn't feed this imaginary great big evil capitalist machine that they claim to detest (whilst obviously benefitting from it at the same time). It's the same here in Belfast where for months, kids will apply all their efforts and ingenuity to scavenge wood and materials and build huge bonfires for the July 11th events, then stand round them drinking Carly Spesh and Tennants Super til they pass out - they'd have been far better off getting a job and having a bit of cash in their pocket after 3 months honest work. Crazy!
- Paddy, Belfast, 01/04/2009 10:54
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Couldn't someone have glued the doors closed?
- Paul, London, 01/04/2009 10:33
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