Spectacularly wrong target

I ATTENDED the ESF session on racism and fascism, and was astonished to find the stage occupied by a bunch of masked people who claimed to be protesting against Ken Livingstone. I

f they had chosen the recent New Labour conference for their egotistical and elitist outburst I would not have been bothered. But to disrupt a unique opportunity for activists from across Europe to discuss and organise against fascism is unacceptable.

The pleas of black people at the meeting were ignored, and the black chair of the event was assaulted and robbed.

Luckily for the middle class anarchists involved in this stunt there were not many black people at the event. Next time there will be.

Gary McFarlane North London



My voice was silenced

I WAS absolutely horrified at what took place in the meeting on fighting fascism at the recent European Social Forum in London.

Many relatives on my mother s side experienced the Nazis at first hand during the Second World War. I now live in an area of Essex where a fascist councillor has been elected so the meeting was of significant importance to me.

Being only five feet tall, I did not havethe stature to get heard from the floor, so I made my way to the stage. Once there I tried to express why I thought that the meeting should be allowed to go ahead. I was physically pushed off the stage by two tall white males and told to "fuck off" because they "didn't care" .

My right to have a voice had been taken away. As a youth worker I brought a group of young people to the ESF who were equally horrified with the events. My union colleagues were shocked that an anti-fascist meeting had been broken up.

Beccy Palmer East London Unite against the BNP