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Swiss Police Seal Off Davos as Business Summit Starts
By Adrian Croft
Reuters
DAVOS, Switzerland (Jan. 25) - Hundreds of Swiss police, specialist troops
and coils of barbed wire greeted the world's corporate and political elite as
the annual Davos business summit got under way Thursday.
Nervousness over the state of the global economy mingled with worries that
violent demonstrators could disrupt the annual meeting of the World Economic
Forum (WEF), now in its 31st year, which runs until next Tuesday.
Swiss Television estimated that between 1,000 and 2,000 police from across
Switzerland were on hand to choke off the kind of anti-globalization protests
that hit the European Union summit in Nice, International Monetary Fund/World
Bank meetings in Prague and Davos itself last year.
''The World Economic Forum has become the symbol of a global civilization in
formation, of a world where barriers collapse, of a world which makes us
dream of an ever greater liberty,'' Swiss President Moritz Leuenberger told
the opening session.
Police, mounting the strictest clampdown Switzerland has seen in decades,
said they were considering spraying liquid manure at anti-globalization
demonstrators if they defy a ban on a planned demonstration against the forum
Saturday.
''No decision has been made. Police are reviewing various means that could be
used, for example rubber shotgun pellets or tear gas or water or manure,''
cantonal police spokesman Alois Hafner told Reuters.
At last year's forum, some 2,000 anti-free trade demonstrators, denouncing
the gathering as a ''meeting of murderers,'' broke shop windows and smashed
car windshields at a McDonald's restaurant.
STAR-STUDDED CAST
Dozens of heads of state and hundreds of senior corporate executives are
among 3,200 participants at this year's summit in the chic skiing spot that
has become a magnet for movers and shakers from business and politics.
Participants include Japan's Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori, Palestinian leader
Yasser Arafat, Mexican President Vicente Fox, Yugoslav President Vojislav
Kostunica and Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez.
Israeli elder statesman Shimon Peres and U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan
are also scheduled to attend, raising the possibility of some Middle East
dialogue in Davos.
Environmentalists and opponents of free trade say the participants in the
forum make far-reaching decisions behind closed doors and enhance the power
of multinational corporations.
Inside the meeting hall, discussions were denominated by fears that a
slowdown in the United States, long the motor of the world economy, could
spread to the rest of the world.
Analysts at the forum concluded that the world would probably avoid
recession, however.
The cautious mood was a far cry from last year's forum, when optimism was
high for sustained, low-inflation growth in the United States and rising
stock prices.
This year's star-studded guest list has been weakened by the absence of any
top officials from the new U.S. administration of President Bush, but World
Economic Forum President Klaus Schwab said he did not feel snubbed by their
absence.
Schwab said the United States was strongly represented by members of Congress
and the lack of administration representatives was inevitable given the
recent handover of power.
ARBITRARY ACTION ALLEGED
Critics of the forum complained about tactics used by police, who they said
were walking through trains headed for Davos and stopping some passengers
from traveling.
''They are absolutely at random. I witnessed it in the train last night. They
walked through the train and they took out four people without any clear
evidence. They didn't like their appearance. There is no legal right to do
that,'' said Peter Bosshard, a member of the Berne Declaration, a Swiss group
promoting what it sees as fairer relations between the industrialized world
and developing countries.
Police spokesman Hafner rejected allegations of arbitrary action.
''If people were seen traveling to Davos in possession of propaganda material
or carried falsified press badges we had to assume they were not real
journalists or real snowboarders and they were turned away,'' he said.
David Boehner, a member of an anti-World Trade Organization group helping to
organize Saturday's planned demonstration, said he expected up to 5,000
people at the protest, which he said would go ahead despite being declared
illegal.
Eager to dispel criticism of Davos as a capitalist conspiracy to set the
world agenda, organizers say they have given trade unions, lobby groups,
environmentalists and other critics of the system unprecedented exposure this
year.
But this has not satisfied a coalition of environmental and developing
country groups that has organized an alternative conference in Davos this
week dealing with subjects such as trade and ''making global corporations
accountable.''
Some 10,000 people are also expected at the World Social Forum in Porto
Alegre, Brazil, that will run in parallel with the Davos meeting and condemn
Western-style economic policies.
REUTERS 13:57 01-25-01
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"You've got to stand for something, or you're gonna fall for anything."
-- John Mellencamp
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