BY SEAN HEALY

Anti-globalisation protesters demonstrated in their thousands on March 17 in the southern Italian city of Naples against the Global Forum, a meeting of government officials and representatives of the largest information technology multinationals.

More than 10,000 demonstrators marched through the streets of the city, seeking to reach the convention centre where the meeting was taking place.

They were turned back by an army of 6000 riot police, who attacked them with tear gas and batons. Dozens of demonstrators were injured, including one pregnant woman, and several journalists and photographers were also beaten; parliamentarians and journalists have since joined protest organisers to condemn the police's violent assault.

The protest organisers, the No Global Network, included anarchists, socialists, environmentalists and representatives of organisations of the city's unemployed. They say their actions were to protest against the control of the big corporations over technology and society, which has meant that the advent of advanced information technology, potentially liberating for millions of people, has actually exacerbated inequality between the world's rich and poor.

In coordination with the street protests, anti-capitalist activists organise a “Netstrike” aimed at jamming the lines of one of Italy's largest stock quote companies, in protest at the dominance of finance capital in determining the direction of internet advances.

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