Protests against European economic summit draw about 3,000 in Poland

About 3,000 anti-globalization activists marched Thursday against a European economic summit, protesting capitalism, unemployment and the U.S. invasion of Iraq. Police barriers kept protesters several hundred metres away from the hotel where hundreds of business and political leaders, including some 20 heads of state or government, attended the second day of a conference on the future of the expanded European Union. The demonstration was mostly peaceful and no arrests were reported. Banners read Capitalism Kills, Let's Kill Capitalism, Shut Down the Summit of Unemployment, War and Corruption, Away with Global U.S. Terror, and No Blood For Oil. Many protested the U.S.-led war and occupation in Iraq, which the Polish government has supported by sending troops. As protesters passed by police, some threw rolls of toilet paper and yelled, "Fascists! Bourgeois! Your end is coming!" They then moved on to the U.S. Embassy, chanting, "Americans go home!" At the office of Prime Minister Leszek Miller, they yelled, "Thieves!" The European Economic Summit is organized by the Geneva-based World Economic Forum, which anti-globalization groups view as an exclusive club representing the rich. Protesters regularly target the forum's annual conference in Davos, Switzerland, but are kept far away by police.