I have just watched the news footage again of the APEC debacle. I am still stunned by the overzealous use of force by the police. I realise at least two officer's were assaulted, however the behaviour of some police toward innocent protesters needs further investigation. The prime minister, Premier Iemma and the police commissioner, Andrew Scipione all praised the police actions. Mr Howard said that he fully supported all of the actions of the NSW police: does this include pushing (with great force) a female photographer from the US? What about the arrest of the 52 year old accountant taking his son for a meal -he was guilty of innocently straying into the wrong place! I think the massive police presence had more to do with stopping protesters than stopping terrorists.

Many of the police officer's were not wearing name tags (they are required to by their own procedures) making it hard to identify officers who were abusive and aggressive. It is amazing how many people receive the so-called 'hamburger with the lot' from police - Assault police, Resist arrest and Offensive language'. I hope the authorities (or the victims themselves) take appropriate action against the officers concerned. Where is Australia heading? We are continually seeing government authoritarian attitudes being used against the citizenry. It would appear that dissent is strongly frowned upon and new police powers are regularly being made by governments. Where will it end?

ummm..is that "PRAWN".....or "PAWN" ? :)

This is the first time I've noticed you popping your head up here.. and it is unfortunately to pour out negativity about the Police.

The realities of life are:

1/ "real" police are ...shock horror.. human.
2/ Once people start hurling darts and iron bars around..their 'humanity' comes very much to the forefront.. its called the 'survival' instinct.
3/ There are people in those crowds with the specific and deliberate goal of provoking the police.
4/ The police don't know who they are.. apart from some serious pests who's identity they may know, but..cannot see if face masks are used.

STOP WHINING about 'overkill'.. you don't live in Cronulla DO you ?
I'll guarantee if you were white and living in Cronulla during december 2005 you would be beyond appreciative for any overkill which may have stopped numerous trashing of cars, beatings, shootings, stabbings.. aah..

At THAT time the only cry we heard was 'WHERE WERE THE POLICE'?
Now..that they have finally got their act together it's
"Ohh look at the nasty police"

I've been the victim of NSW police overkill.. and it stunned me, (many years ago) but if I'd not been where I was, or doing what to me was innocent... they would not have dragged me into a shop door front and threatened to take me down the park and beat the living daylights out of me. I'm not going to mock and call the whole police force into question because of that.

IMPORTANT.. events which will unfold in days to come, will show exactly WHY the police are in such a high state of readiness, and I doubt it has much to do with stupid loud mouthed APEC protesters.

Is this the same Boazy who wrote on another thread this morning "Just imagine Braveheart.. when he yelled 'but they'll never take our freeeeedom'...yep..thats how I feel too."?

Seems to me that your fervour for freedom is somewhat selective, old boy.

Boaz, another of the "realities of life" is that you were in Melbourne at the time... by the way, how did your own demo go, with your green triangle placard? Any excitement there?

There is no doubt that the Sydney "measures" were overdone. It wouldn't have been half so bad if they had inherited a little of the Olympic spirit, where all the inconveniences were handled with humour and aplomb, by the boys in blue and the public alike.

As it was, there were sour-faced, arrogant coppers at every corner, and double that at every railway station, who had been encouraged to make our lives as uncomfortable as possible in the name of our own "safety". Their humour was inevitably reflected by a resentful populace.

Unfortunately, they were led by an over-zealous command-and-control nut, whose answer to everything was that Sydney was to enjoy an experience where "too much policing is never enough", to borrow from Roy and HG.

This shortcoming was also the reason the Chaser episode succeeded: the barricades were manned by people who so much enjoyed making the lives of the average pedestrian miserable, that they failed to spot a guy with a long beard in a limousine.

And let's face it. After all the publicity about the streets being filled with vicious and dangerous demonstrators, the police were keen as mustard to turn every scuffle into a confrontation so that they could strut their stuff. Self-fulfilling prophecy, even though only a tenth of the demonstrators "predicted" actually turned up.

What was that movie - Speed? - where the villain said something like "once you've built it, it's in the nature of a bomb to explode". Prepare the boys with the riot gear for a riot, and there will be one, whether you like it or not.

The footage I've seen has been quite selectively edited. In particular, we never seem to see what preceded the alleged over zealous use of force on the part of the police. Now, I'm not arguing that the police are necessarily innocent, but it bothers me that I've not seen one incident where the police response could not be justified by some event in the unseen immediately preceding footage.

A particular example is NineMSN's footage of an accountant who was arrested.

http://tinyurl.com/ypqahv

which skips from a quiet discussion with police to a forceful arrest, but with the possibly highly significant interim omitted.

There is a possibility that the media are editing this footage to create stories where none really exist.

Sylvia.

That said, in this footage

http://ninemsn.video.msn.com/v/en-au/v.htm?g=347cf87c-50ab-47a3-a0be-da23de81841c&f=39&fg=copy

where the man in the hat is being lead away, violence seems to erupt as a direct result of one of the police officers, who isn't even involved in the arrest, quite unnecessarily grabbing the man's hat (about 1 min 34 seconds in).

Sylvia.