AP (with additional material by BBC and Ananova). 26 January 2002. Resurgent Unrest Challenges Argentina's Latest President. BUENOS AIRES -- Citizen anger over a government banking freeze erupted into fresh unrest early Saturday as President Eduardo Duhalde confronted the first nationwide protest against his rule. Riot police used tear gas and rubber bullets to disperse hundreds of peaceful demonstrators and rock-throwing youths on the fringes of a rally winding down late Friday night. Demonstrators lingered in the streets for hours early Saturday before crowds began melting away before dawn. At least 13 people were reported injured in clashes outside the government palace, known as the Casa Rosada, beginning around midnight. Dozens of people reportedly were detained. The violence began late Friday amid a driving rain as some 10,000 people entered the streets to bang pots and pans in what, for hours, was a peaceful nighttime protest. Adolfo Valotta, a 29-year-old lawyer demonstrating in the streets early Saturday, said Argentines are rightly angry with their government for the economic mess. "We are fed up with the politicians. People want their money, and solutions that will end this crisis," Valotta said. "The government isn't moving fast enough." Duhalde had no immediate comment Saturday on the violence outside the government palace, in which sparking tear gas canisters scattered panicked people. Large-scale riots outside the same palace in late December toppled the last elected president, Fernando De la Rua, amid rioting and looting nationwide that claimed 26 lives. At the height of the Buenos Aires clashes, youths threw Molotov cocktails and paving stones at motorcycle police, who then fired rubber bullets into crowds. At one point, a reporter for The Associated Press saw police unleash a barrage of rubber bullets and tear gas at demonstrators sitting on the steps of the downtown cathedral. Ten police officers and at least three demonstrators were reported injured, including a man who collapsed with rubber bullet wounds to his back. Volley after volley of tear gas exploded over the downtown Plaza de Mayo, fronting the government palace, as scores of riot police moved in and cleared mostly peaceful demonstrators from the square. Protests began peacefully, with people ranging from middle class professionals to the unemployed banging pots and pans and jangling their keys in an almost carnival-like demonstration. But as the march petered out around midnight in pouring rain, police fired on the 1,000 or so who remained in the Plaza de Mayo, fighting running battles with the protesters. After the clashes on the Plaza de Mayo subsided, several hundred demonstrators regrouped near Congress and taunted club-wielding riot police in an edgy confrontation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Barry Stoller http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ProletarianNews
