From: Barry Stoller <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Argentina declares state of siege Reuters. 19 December 2001. Riots and Looting in Argentina as Austerity Plans Bite. BUENOS AIRES -- Argentina declared a state of siege on Wednesday as police fired tear gas and rubber bullets to disperse looters who ransacked stores in the capital and elsewhere in the nation in rioting triggered by government austerity measures and rising poverty. The state of siege gave the government special powers to combat the growing lawlessness, according to officials who asked not to be named. Dozens of supermarkets and shops were ransacked in Buenos Aires and the northern Entre Rios province as hundreds of Argentines smashed shop windows, stealing items including food, clothing, toilet paper and televisions. The rioting began last week, but snowballed on Wednesday. Police in riot gear guarded many supermarkets stocked for Christmas as troubles mounted for President Fernando de la Rua, struggling to head off a four-year recession, 18.3 percent unemployment and the biggest sovereign debt default ever. Five police officers were injured in civil unrest worse even than the food riots that helped topple President Raul Alfonsin in 1989. Looters battled with baton-wielding police only a mile away from the presidential palace. With growing impatience with De la Rua, protesters chanted and threw eggs and a paving stone at the president as he left a meeting. The paving stone hit the roof of his limousine. Stinging tear gas hung in the humid, hot summer air where looters gathered. As sporadic riots spread to the center of Buenos Aires, banks reinforced security and shops closed amid reports that protesters were approaching. Many streets so far unaffected by riots appeared like ghost towns with shutters down. Some supermarkets handed out food packages in an effort to stop looting by thousands of Argentines gathering outside stores. But in one zone, managers in suits and ties tried to defend one supermarket with wooden hockey sticks. In many other raids on stores, police stood idly by, hands behind their backs, and watched as looters ran out of shops laden with goods, witnesses said. In Cordoba, the country's second-largest city, police fired rubber bullets at municipal workers protesting unpaid wages. The workers chanted slogans as tear gas filled municipal offices. In the northeastern Entre Rios province, vastly outnumbered security forces watched helplessly as hundreds of looters fled with goods, shielded by smoke billowing from burning tires. "Here we go, Buenos Aires. There you go, De la Rua!" some chanted as they held up stolen goods for the cameras. Television images showed shops littered with boxes and glass and some shopkeepers weeping. Argentina is a pale shadow of the confident nation whose economy grew by half in the 1990s to become the center of the Internet revolution in Latin America. Among the protesters were many who said they were poor, unemployed and hungry, including mothers with children, but there also were protesters, or unidentified "agitators," according to a government spokesman. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Barry Stoller http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ProletarianNews with photo attachments of the riots. _________________________________________________ KOMINFORM P.O. Box 66 00841 Helsinki Phone +358-40-7177941 Fax +358-9-7591081 http://www.kominf.pp.fi General class struggle news: [EMAIL PROTECTED] subscribe mails to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Geopolitical news: [EMAIL PROTECTED] subscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] __________________________________________________
