US police fire rubber bullets at protesters

POLICE fired rubber bullets yesterday against hundreds of anti-war protesters blocking a road near Oakland’s port in California, witnesses and officials said.

Local media reported several longshoremen were injured in what is believed to be the first police use of rubber bullets against demonstrators since President George W Bush launched a war on Iraq.

Demonstrators were seeking to block access to American President Lines, a shipping company they claimed was profiting from the war. Police at the scene said they used two types of rubber bullets to disperse about 750 protesters and some arrests were made.

Oakland Police spokeswoman Danielle Ashford said police used “sting balls”, also known as rubber pellets, and bean-bags to disperse the crowd. “We gave them an order, we gave them ample time to disperse,” she said.

A group of about 150 protesters remained after the initial burst of rubber bullets dispersed the crowd and police continued to fire on them, a photographer at the scene said.

In San Francisco, police arrested about 18 protesters at the Federal Building in a separate demonstration.

Anti-war activists in the San Francisco area said they were launching a series of protest actions yesterday after a period of relative quiet in a city famous for its history of dissent. Police arrested more than 2,000 people in San Francisco in the first two days of the war.

In New York, several dozen people were arrested and charged with disorderly conduct in an anti-war protest that blocked the entrance to the Manhattan building of the Carlyle Group, which has a significant stake in the defence industry.

Up to 300 people chanted “Carlyle gets fat on war” outside the offices of the $14 billion investment group.

The M27 Coalition of protesters said the demonstration was part of a “day of direct action” against the war.

The same group organised a “die in” on March 27 that snarled traffic in Manhattan during morning rush-hour and led to more than 200 arrests.