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Mexico riot police seal Congress to vote protesters
MEXICO CITY, Aug 15 (Reuters) - Hundreds of Mexican riot police in black body armor sealed Congress on Tuesday after violent clashes with leftist protesters and legislators who say last month's presidential election was stolen.
Police blocked streets around the Congress building, closing the area to prevent the return of demonstrators who want to rebuild a tent city to protest what they say was election fraud.
With the imposing concrete building surrounded by police, no protesters went near Congress on Tuesday.
Police blocked streets around the Congress building, closing the area to prevent the return of demonstrators who want to rebuild a tent city to protest what they say was election fraud.
With the imposing concrete building surrounded by police, no protesters went near Congress on Tuesday.
About 15 legislators from the left-wing party whose presidential candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador narrowly lost the July 2 election, were among those hurt on Monday when police tore down tents in their partially built camp, tear gassed protesters and drove them back with clubs.
It was the first violence since the election protests began weeks ago.
Lopez Obrador accused the government of repression.
More
It was the first violence since the election protests began weeks ago.
Lopez Obrador accused the government of repression.
More
For more information:
http://today.reuters.com/news/articleinves...
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Lopez Obrador's backers also picketed the Federal Electoral Tribunal as it met to resolve election disputes, and they maintained around-the-clock tent camps across large swaths of central Mexico City.
Lawmakers from Lopez Obrador's Democratic Revolution Party, or PRD, later filed a complaint against police and said Sen. Elias Moreno Brizuela had suffered a rib injury, Congressman Juan Jose Garcia suffered minor head wounds, and three other legislators apparently were bruised or shaken.
"Not even in the worst era of the PRI did they do this," Moreno Brizuela said, referring to the Institutional Revolutionary Party, which ruled Mexico with a heavy hand from 1929 to 2000. "They attacked us ... and beat us." Television footage also showed protesters attacking police.
More
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/14/AR2006081401488.html
Leftist lawmakers were among at least 30 people injured in the scuffles outside Congress in Mexico City.
Mr Lopez Obrador's supporters have been camped out in protest at the 2 July election they say was stolen by conservative rival Felipe Calderon.
This is the first time the authorities have used force on the protesters.
Mr Lopez Obrador later told his supporters that the events showed the authorities are "taking off their masks and putting aside their talk of supposed legality and respect".
Mr Lopez Obrador lost the election by 240,000 votes. He alleged fraud, and has since led a mass civil disobedience campaign to demand a full recount.
A court-imposed recount of votes from 9% of polling centres has been completed but the result has not yet been announced.
Mr Calderon told a news conference he was confident the recount would confirm his victory, and called on Mr Lopez Obrador to "reconsider his attitude".
More
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4793271.stm
Mexico's Federal Preventative Police injured five deputies and many other protestors on Monday, at a protest supporting left-wing presidential candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, outside the country's Congress, local media reported.
The police hit deputies -- Dolores Padierna, Emilio Serrano, Miguel Moreno Brizuela, Juan Jose Garcia Ochoa and Susana Manzanares, all from Obrador's Revolutionary Democratic Party -- in the arms and stomach, as they tried to set up a camp outside the legislature, as part of a larger group of protestors, challenging the country's election results.
The police and crowd battled outside the building with the police using truncheons and tear gas, and the protestors using stones and bottles.
The protestors allege widespread fraud in the July 2 elections, whose official result gave right-wing candidate Felipe Calderon of the incumbent National Action Party (PAN) a slender 0.58 percentage point victory over Obrador.
Incumbent president, Vicente Fox, also of the PAN, will give his sixth and final state of the nation report at the Congress on Sep. 1, a day when PRD supporters have planned an intensification of their protests.
PRD supports claim the election was marred by widespread fraud.
http://english.people.com.cn/200608/15/eng20060815_293175.html