ENOMOMY: MIAMI FTAA

Alternet: Miami Vice

Editor's Note: Tom Hayden, reporting for AlterNet from the Free Trade
Area of the Americas conference in Miami, filed this update Thursday
evening. The original story follows the update.

UPDATE. MIAMI. 10:30 EST, Thursday An ugly and bloodier ending to the
Miami FTAA meeting was averted by a sudden decision tonight to end the closed
official events one day early. FTAA co-chairs from the US and Brazil
both described the summit as a step forward though it was widely understood
that the agreement was far less than the American business community and the
White House originally hoped for.

At 5:30 pm, besieged protestors at the convergence center, threatened
by the spectre of mass arrests, put out a televised appeal for public
solidarity. At virtually the same moment, word came from within the
FTAA meeting that an agreement had been reached. At 6:45, the agreement was
announced at a press conference of all the trade ministers, and shortly
afterwards the police encirclement of the convergence center seemed to
be lifted.

"They finished early because there was nothing to be gained from
another day of bad publicity from the streets, and there was nothing to
negotiate beyond an agreement to keep negotiating in the future," said
Washington-based trade expert Mark Weisbrot. A perplexed Wall Street
Journal reporter asked FTAA officials whether "after nine years you've
agreed to keep moving forward but with lesser goals than before."
Brazilian foreign minister Celso Amorim, carefully choosing a word in English
said only that the agreement was "enabling."

Tallahasse IMC: Thanks for the Pepper Spray, Pigs (FTAA Nov. 20)

An eyewitness account of protest activity from a member of the FSU contingent in Miami.
Hey Everyone,

This is what I saw happened, and what happened to me at the FTAA protest in Miami.

After the march, a lot of people headed inside for the rally. After 1/2 an hour (?), my friend and I looked outside and saw a large group of people moving through the AFL-CIO marshall lines towards the fence and the riot cops. We went outside to join, and on the way, met up with several other FSU folks. We moved to the front, maybe 2 or 3 rows back from the cops. We were all loudly chanting "Shut It Down!" The cops were speaking over a bullhorn, but we couldn't hear them over the chanting.

Then the police came into the lines a-swingin', spraying pepper spray, and apparently shooting rubber bullets (I was told that later, I didn't realize it was happening at the time, but I'd seen the snipers up in their cranes). We were all falling back. We all began yelling to hold the lines and we linked arms. Then the police were suddenly on my line and they sprayed me directly in the eyes with pepper spray.

I turned and moved back, got some water to squirt in my eyes. Everyone around me asked me if I was fine, and I thought I would be okay, but then I started to feel dizzy and began going blind. I saw another FSU person and asked him to get me to a safe place. He grabbed my hand and led me away and then began squirting my eyes some more. He got shot with a rubber bullet, and then there was tear gas coming so we had to fall back more. I turned and saw a girl hit the ground about 10 feet behind me, blood coming out of her head. I ran back and helped someone else pick her up and move her away, shouting for a medic. Soon more people came to help her, she was bleeding bad, and we kept shouting for a medic. As soon as one came, I approached a group of three people and asked for water. They gave me a squirt bottle and some water, and then someone I'd met at the protest came up and squirted my eyes out.