Protesters return to NY park

AFP/New YorkA couple dozen demonstrators resumed their Occupy Wall Street protest yesterday in New York’s

Occupy DC protesters march in the streets of Washington on Tuesday night. The protesters were marching to show solidarity with Occupy Wall Street protesters who were evicted from New York’s Zuccotti Park

Zuccotti Park, a day after the movement’s weeks-long vigil against corporate greed was scattered by police. One demonstrator said three people were arrested overnight for lying down, in violation of newly-enforced rules that also prohibited sleeping bags and camping gear in the park. Of those who were in the park, one man slept with his head on a granite table, while another dozed on a bench. Police also arrested one demonstrator early yesterday who was involved in a scuffle. For two months, Lower Manhattan’s Zuccotti Park had been home to a makeshift tent village that was the symbolic epicentre of a movement that has inspired similar protests in other US cities and abroad. But police early on Tuesday cleared the park and arrested about 200 of its occupants in a surprise pre-dawn operation, leaving cleaning crews to cart off piles of tents and other gear before scrubbing the square clean. Later in the day, a judge ruled that while owners of the park and the authorities could not deny protesters their constitutional right to freedom of speech by banning entry to park, the protesters must abide by a ban on camping out there. “Zuccotti Park will remain open to all who want to enjoy it, as long as they abide by the park’s rules,” Mayor Michael Bloomberg said in a statement after the court decision. Protesters were allowed to begin returning late on Tuesday, but the handful who spent the night were deprived the comfort of sleeping bags after the city began enforcing the park’s no-camping prohibition. Still, protesters were elated at being allowed back into the Manhattan park, owned by Brookfield Properties, which they have been occupying since mid-September. Officers let the protesters back in one-by-one at a newly-created checkpoint. “No one will be denied entry,” a police officer said at the gate, as people began to wander back in again. Bloomberg said the judge’s ruling “vindicates our position that First Amendment rights do not include the right to endanger the public or infringe on the rights of others by taking over a public space with tents and tarps.”

An Occupy Wall Street demonstrator smiles while holding a sign after being allowed back into Zuccotti Park on Tuesday

Demonstrator Dallas Carter, 32, said the protesters “have to go back to court to get the tents and sleeping bags again. But it’s still a victory.” “The police don’t have too much choice,” said another activist, Mike Reilly, 28, from Philadelphia. “The movement will survive in one way or another.” Both sides were claiming victory after judge Michael Stallman ruled that the owners of the park and the authorities were not denying protesters their constitutional right to freedom of speech by banning them from camping out. Cheering protesters agreed to march today to the New York Stock Exchange to mark the movement’s two-month anniversary. Helmeted New York police poured into the park - a short walk from the stock exchange and the site of the World Trade Center - at about 1am (0600 GMT) Tuesday with bright lights and an army of sanitation workers.About 200 people were arrested during the surprise operation, which saw only sporadic violence and ended before dawn, leaving cleaning crews to cart off piles of tents and other gear before scrubbing the square clean. Small business owners near Zuccotti Park had complained about the noise and unsanitary conditions in the camp, accusing the demonstrators of trashing their store bathrooms and driving away customers. Pressure had been mounting on Bloomberg to resolve the situation in a neighbourhood already strained by years of disruption from the World Trade Center rebuilding project. Tuesday’s development in New York left the Occupy DC protest in Washington as one of the last significant permanent camps created by the movement. “I don’t think there’s any plan on leaving,” said Marc Smith, a spokesman. “There’s really not too much concern at this point.” More than 300 protesters marched on the White House on Tuesday, inviting President Barack Obama - who was en route to Australia at the time - to side with their movement. Elsewhere, at least 1,000 marchers descended on the campus of the University of California at Berkeley, but school officials said they would not allow them to set up a new camp. White House spokesman Jay Carney said Obama was “aware” of the situation but maintained that “each municipality has to make its own decisions about how to handle these issues.” “We would hope and want that... a balance is sought between the long tradition of freedom of assembly (and) freedom of speech in this country.”