Every Aspects of Tense Genoa

The atmosphere in the Italian city of Genoa was tense on Thursday, a day before the G8 summit.

Italian police committed 20,000 police officers and set up the barricade in many folds centering around the place where the summit is to take place. However, anti-globalization organizations have declared that 150,000 protesters will break down the police blockade on Friday when the summit begins. Therefore, some people are concerned that bloodshed may take place.

- Italian police in fact blockaded the Italian city of Genoa where the G8 summit will take place from Wednesday. The police also resumed the regulation of the border in order to prevent the protesters’ entry into Italy. Once the summit starts, airport, railway stations, and ports will be closed down.

The streets around the summit venue have been declared a `yellow zone`, which is the first police line, and a `red zone`. There are concrete barriers and a four-meter-high steel fences to block the attack by cars. The police have limited the entry into the `red zone` only allowing the participants of the summit, those who have special identification cards, and the `red zone` residents

It is anticipated that the summit may take place on board of a ship in Genoa port changing the summit place of the Palazzo Ducale if the anti-globalization protests become serious. Although most of the leaders will stay on a cruise liner in Genoa port, President George W. Bush was reported to stay in an area where the U.S. security team will guard.

- According to the reports, Genoa looked like a city where the martial law was enforced since shops closed and the police, armed with tear gas guns and water guns, patrolled until late night. As it seemed inevitable to arrest the large number of protesters, the Italian government already empted the prisons in Genoa to expropriate the arrested protesters, said the BBC.

- Representatives of the anti-globalization organizations are assembling to Genoa under the banner of the `protest against the G8 summit` from all over the world. The Italian government estimated that 3,000 protesters arrived in Genoa as of Tuesday. Having anticipated that the police would block the city, the `Genoa Social Forum`, known as the main organizer of the anti-globalization protests in Genoa, already informed the 700 anti-globalization organizations worldwide to arrive in Genoa before the police starts to block the city. The local news reported that rumor had it that the followers of `terrorist Osama Bin Laden` were preparing the air attack. Moreover, the anti-globalization protesters are giving hard time to the police by making the `trick phone calls`. The Italian police was all in a flurry due to the 60 phone calls saying `bomb was found`.

- Jose Bove, the leader of the French peasants` movement and star of the anti-globalization protests, arrived in Genoa on Wednesday. He said, ``G8 leaders, under the protection of hundred and thousand numbers of police and military, seek to make this summit as the new Yalta Conference to divide the world.`` Bove led the anti-globalization protests in Seattle during the WTO meeting in 1999.

phark@donga.com