Diamondback commentary
  Oct 3, 2002                                               
  University Protesters: D.C. Police suppress civil rights          
                                                                  
  We are 13 university students who were arrested with two                           
  Diamondback reporters on Friday. The D.C. Metropolitan Police    
  illegally arrested us to silence us and the reporters who        
  were trying to get our message to the university.                
                                                                  
  We engaged in First Amendment-protected speech in Washington,   
  the "cradle of democracy," and were arrested and silenced. We    
  had a permit to assemble in Freedom Plaza, a public park. We     
  legally exercised our freedom of assembly, then the police       
  surrounded us without warning, did not let us leave and          
  wrongfully - and at times with excessive force - arrested us.
  When we asked why we were arrested, several police officers      
  said they would "make something up later." After about 29        
  hours in custody, they charged us with "failure to obey."        
  However, no dispersal order or warning was given and we         
  clearly chanted "We wish to exit peacefully" while police        
  violently closed in around us. They detained us for almost 30    
  hours to keep us from protesting the International Monetary     
  Fund and the World Bank.
                                                                   
  We protested the United States's continued violence against      
  Iraqis in the form of sanctions that starve them and bombing    
  that destroys them. According to Denis Halliday, the U.N.'s     
  former coordinator of the oil-for-food program, sanctions on    
  Iraq cause the deaths of between 4,000 and 5,000 Iraqi         
  children monthly. He told Reuters, "It doesn't impact on
  governance effectively and instead it damages the innocent      
  people of the country ... It probably strengthens the           
  leadership and further weakens the people of the country."
                                                                   
  President Bush's plans to escalate violence against innocent     
  Iraqis will increase the Iraqi civilian death toll.             
  Carpetbombing will not free them or improve peace and            
  security. Attacking Iraq does not make the lives lost on         
  Sept. 11 or Saddam Hussein's slaughter of the Kurds any less
  tragic.

  In jail, we were upset the government was preventing us from
  speaking against the IMF and World Bank. The U.N. Commission
  on Human Rights described their Structural Adjustment
  Programs (now referred to by the misnomer "Poverty Reduction
  Strategies") as "the self-deceptive and destructive game of
  managing third-world economies from afar and forcing
  unpopular economic policies down the throats of powerless
  third-world countries ... Two decades later, many countries
  are in worse condition than when they started implementing
  IMF/World Bank Structural Adjustment Programs."

  These countries' governments repeal labor laws and attack
  unions, lower or remove minimum wages, and weaken or remove
  environmental and health laws to make their (unprotected)
  workforce seem more appealing to multinational corporations
  in search of cheap labor. Coca-Cola, for example, refuses to
  pay for its African workers' HIV/AIDS treatment. Its
  employees are literally dying so Coke can turn a bigger
  profit.

  Unfortunately, the world did not hear our protests because we
  were arrested. Friday's arrests are institutionalized and
  preemptive political repression through systematic disregard
  for civil liberties. Under the guise of public safety, our
  freedom was stripped in Freedom Plaza. We were hog-tied and
  many of us were forced to pay $50-$100 and forfeit our
  constitutional right to a trial to be released. This made the
  police's actions uniformed and brutal armed robbery,
  kidnapping and extortion.

  Violently suppressing free speech is not what democracy looks
  like.

  The authors are: Kristin Bricker, senior, sociology and
  women's studies; Edward Burns, university graduate, class of
  2002; Jason Castonguay, senior, computer science; Debra
  Eisenman, sophomore, government and politics; Simon
  Fitzgerald, sophomore, government and politics; Ryan Holmes,
  sophomore, letters and sciences; Dan Levitan, sophomore,
  government and politics; Sarah Krones, sophomore,
  environmental science and policy; Manish Pant, senior,
  psychology, physiology and neurobiology; Jen Rosloff,
  sophomore, government and politics; Kobi Snitz, math graduate
  student; Ariel Vegosen, senior, journalism and Kristen
  Williamson, freshman, theatre. They can be reached at
  castongj@umd.edu.