
Issue No 57		09 June 2000

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Letters to the Editor

Expo 2000 Opens with Violence Against Left

HANOVER, Germany (ej) - Germany's first world fair, Expo 2000, opened June 1st to Latin American music from Brazil and chanting from anti-capitalist campaigners. The Expo grounds, almost as big as an average town, filled quickly with visitors, most of whom had not paid US-$57, nearly double the standard price of US-$33, for the experience. Owing to subdued public interest in the event, Expo organizers have admitted giving free entry to over 38,000 local schoolchildren and 6,000 Expo building workers as well as an unknown amount of local and international VIPs trying to boost attendance on the first day to more than 100,000.

Just as German President Johannes Rau cut the ribbon for the public opening of the five-month burlesque in the northern city of Hanover, as well as during the opening speech by German Prime Minister Schroeder, a larger amount of left-wing demonstrators began chanting "Expo No" beyond perimeter fences.

Expo 2000, which is expected by local sources of the left Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS) to lose around US-$290 million or more, has been dogged by controversy ever since it was conceived to showcase the "new" Germany born out of unification a decade ago. Host city Hanover has a long record of rebel action and even violence by unsatisfied young people, based on a strong left subculture in the capital of Lower Saxony.

Police herded protesters away but there were no arrests on Expo ground. Not all German and foreign dignitaries ignored the chanting, even local union and church leaders belong to the faction of Expo opponents.

Outside, Expo opponents flung burning tires on to the main Hanover-Hamburg railway line, halting trains for half an hour. Blockades on streets, leading to the Expo grounds, lasted over one hour.

The protesters see the fair as a "neoliberal" glorification of capitalism with its pavilions and exhibits from over 170 nations and international organizations and share their critics with the protesters at Washington and Seattle a few months ago.

"This a waste of public money to spend it on VIPs and big business and on a Disney Land of , it should better be spent on people of the ", said a social worker (25) among mostly student demonstrators, who gave her first name as Kitty. She sympathized with "Fair Trade Action" and solidarity with the south as well as German public sector workers who will vote next week whether to strike for higher and equal pay in Germany as a whole. East Germans still earn only around 80 % of the West German salaries, 10 years after the reunification of Germany.

Police forces from all over Germany are concentrated at Hanover. They had searched a camp of peaceful anti-Expo activists, known by its inhabitants as part of the FAUST complex, an alternative center of culture and events on the day before Expo opening but made no arrests and declined to comment on a newspaper report that they had seized Molotov cocktails. The protesters affirmed this to be untruth: "This action had been organized to discredit peoples action in the public".

At the early evening of June 1st police herded more than 450 protesters after a peaceful manifestation away. All of them were arrested and taken into small mass cages at Hanover central police headquarters for over 12 hours. Most of them had been forced afterwards to leave Hanover and will be object of a trial by court.

On Saturday, June 1st, young Expo opponents called to celebrate a "Reclaim the Streets-Party" on the streets of Hanover City. But even dancing on the streets was forbidden and brutally interrupted by police violence.

Expo chief Birgit Breuel said in her opening speech: "The Expo has been made by people for people, our guests. It's not virtual. It's there to touch." But subdued public interest in the extravaganza touches only workers and clerks on Expo ground, a lot of them lost their jobs only 5 days after Expo start. Only 15 % of the visitors awaited by the Expo organizers had really shown interest to enter the grounds.

(US-$1-2.088 Mark)

Ekkehard Jaenicke, Hannover / Berlin

(All about the anti-Expo protests in German language: www.expo-calypse.de)

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Issue 57 contents

Interview: Cocky Labor
On the eve of State Conference, Country Labor convenor Tony Kelly outlines how Labor is stealing the ground from under the National Party's feet.

Economics: Millenium Work Ethics - A New Social Partnership?
The future of work in the twenty-first century will be both provocative and challenging, according to Professor Russell Lansbury.

Politics: Extracting the Digit
Labor's federal communications spokesman Stehpen Smith outlines the Party's position on the controversial datacasting legislation currently before Parliament.

History: Hot Off the Press
Check out what's in the latest issue of Labour History - A Journal of Labour and Social History,

International: The East Timor of Africa
Nobel laureate Jose Ramos Horta will this week tell a Sydney audience of the parallels between East Timor and the nation described as the last colony in Africa - the Western Sahara.

Environment: MUA Snail Men Honoured
Brisbane wharfies Lehi Munday and Mal Monro look an unlikely Watson and Sherlock double, but their keen detective work has helped win the Southern Queensland MUA Branch two national environment awards.

Satire: Howard Says 'Sorry'
In a startling apology to the Aboriginal community, Prime Minister John Howard said last night he was deeply sorry that he turned up to the Corroboree 2000 celebrations.

Review: Front Stage and Pulp Fiction
The Waterfront War has made the transition from industrial showdown to cultural icon. Now it's inspiring artists.

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