Fears of violent G8 protests prove unfounded

More than 2,000 demonstrators marched in the rain shouting ‘‘Free the people, not the market’’ and ‘‘G8, shut it down!’’ at the end of a G8 summit in Canada, free of the kind of violence that left a protester dead last year.

The leaders at the secluded summit in western Canada never heard the protesters, who were half a continent away in the capital, Ottawa.