A number of meetings were held in the morning in Liberty Hall &endash; Head quarters of the Trade Union SIPTU. A march was planned that afternoon starting at 3.00pm from Liberty hall. The posters for the event boasted a widespread participation by many different groups including the generic term "Anarchists".
We duly showed up. We had about 1200 Anarchist News to distribute to the crowd flocking out from the meeting. The Anarchist news proved very popular as it had a report from one of the black blocks in Genoa. A few people coming out from the meeting expressed their relief at finally finding some anarchists.
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I would estimate that there was about 300 people there as we went around the corner opposite the statue of James Connolly to listen to some speeches. Trevor Sargent &endash; from the Green Party congratulated everyone who went to Genoa to protest and reminded people that Joe Moffat was still in Prison over there on charges and implored people to monitor closely his situation. It was only really then that I noticed a number of Globalise Resistance placards which read "Remember Carlo Guialini &endash; Free Joe Moffat."
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Then Des Bonass of the Dublin Trades Council gave a speech about what the real effects of Globaisation were at home and how we needed to fight it. Then Mick Barry from the Socialist Party spoke as a person who had been there in Genoa &endash; and he said that there were people who showed up in that Italian city intent on violence &endash; and they are known to us as the Police. [Sinn Fein Councillor Larry O'Toole also spoke]
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[A Personal report from a Workers Solidarity Movement members of an
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The march then assembled and we marched down the quays
&endash; up past O'Connell Street and back down again. We stopped at
the lights near there on the main crossing between Henry Street and
Talbot Street. We were asked to sit down on the street and had a
minutes silence for Carlo. Then the chant arose "Libre Joe Moffat
&endash; Libre Joe Moffat".
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After a couple of minutes we moved off down O'Connell street again. By this time I would estimate that the numbers on the march had swelled to about 600 people. We found that a good number of spectators along the route of the march were interested in what it was about and took leaflets to find out more.
We eventually ended up at Central Bank where there were mores speeches from Richard Boyd Barret of the SWP and our own Ray Cunningham from the Workers Solidarity Movement. I remember that Ray emphasised the numbers on the demonstrations in Genoa and how it was all built for democratically.
The lesson that we must take from it is that we can do this for ourselves. We must start to take the power back into our lives and get organised. Finally Joe (SWP) lead the crowd in an old Italian left song Banderio Rossa and he sang it with passion.
Dermot
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