Suspension will allow the Prof to spend all his time on the G20 protests

Professor suspended over claims he incited G20 violence

• Interview creates trouble for anthropology expert
• Protest organiser revels in ‘perfect storm for enemies’

Comments (53)

• Richard Rogers and Paul Lewis
• The Guardian, Friday 27 March 2009

One of the leading organisers of next Wednesday’s Financial Fools’ Day protests was last night suspended from his role as Professor of Anthropology at the University of East London, on full pay.

Chris Knight, who has been a lecturer in anthropology at the university since 1989, and professor since 2000, was informed of his suspension yesterday evening, and was told it was because of an interview he gave to a newspaper this week in which he is quoted as “inciting criminal action, specifically violence against policemen and women and damage to banking institutions”.

In an interview with the Evening Standard, Knight was pictured with a placard bearing the slogan “Eat the bankers”, and quoted as saying: “If they [the police] want violence, they’ll get it”. He is also quoted by the Standard as advising bankers that on April 1 “if you’re thinking of coming in, my advice is don’t”.

Knight, along with fellow UEL anthropologist Elizabeth Power and former Liberal Democrat councillor turned activist Marina Pepper, set up the G-20meltdown.org website and began to host meetings to which they invited other green and anarchist groups.

Knight told the Guardian last night that he was doing everything possible to make sure there was no violence next week. He said he had set up the protest group with theatrical rather than violent aims.  –more–

The Guardian also has a flashy interactive supplement but it does not look complete for example it is missing the Stop the War demo.

The Guardian also has a a guide to to G20 protests yet might be better to look at UK Indymedia

.

G20 protesters take fiery rhetoric and bunting to ‘big tent City’

Tom Whipple and Fiona Hamilton

At a secret location near King’s Cross, the London branch of Climate Camp holds its last weekly meeting before the G20 summit.Sitting on the floor, a young woman cuts bunting from scraps of clothes. A bearded man eats vegetables from a lunchbox. On the whiteboard is a bullet-pointed agenda for next week’s protests. “Take tea and cakes to the ramparts,” reads one item. “Toilet practice,” reads another. The longest says: “Local outreach — visit shops around City to assure them we mean no harm.”With a £7.2 million policing operation being prepared, Climate Camp, one of the umbrella organisations to emerge from the disparate strands of a decade’s “anti-capitalism” protests, hopes to allay fears that plans to create a vast tent city inside the Square Mile will cause chaos.

But it is one of dozens of protest groups, each with a different idea of what they want from the meeting of the world’s 20 top heads of government. And each has a very different idea of how they want to achieve it. –more–

.

Eco-activists prepare for protest

By Lucy Rodgers BBC News

Police say protesters are planning in an “unprecedented” way for London’s G20 summit next week. But how do campaigners prepare for a demonstration?

Some Climate Camp members played a familiarisation game in the City

Outside Liverpool Street station in the City of London on a Friday evening in March, a band of young people began to congregate.

They arrived in ones, twos and threes – most aged in their early 20s – and could have been meeting for a regular night on the town.

However, the large presence of police inside and outside the station told a different story.

Many in the group were members of Camp for Climate Action – behind direct action protests at Heathrow airport and power stations in North Yorkshire and Kent – and the authorities are watching them carefully.

The main reason for police company was most likely to have been the organisation’s warnings of a day of “spectacular action” at the G20 summit in London next week, when supporters intend to “set up camp” in the City on 1 April.

G20 LONDON SUMMIT World leaders will meet next week in London to discuss measures to tackle the downturn. See our in-depth guide to the G20 summit. The G20 countries are Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, South Korea, Turkey, the United Kingdom, the US and the EU. Q&A: G20 Summit Guide to G20 protest groups

Earlier that same day, the Metropolitan Police had warned some activists were planning in an “unprecedented” way ahead of the meeting and that there were some “very innovative and clever people” involved in the preparations.

And as darkness fell in Bishopsgate, it soon became clear how seriously the authorities were taking the planned demonstrations as one officer took out a video camera and filmed all those waiting and chatting, close enough to record their faces. –more–