general strike in Chile

About 11 o'clock the demonstration started moving from the central station. Up to this time about 500 persons, including students, school students, and people of the health sector, workers, not everybody an obvious member of the CUT (Central Unitaria de Trabajadores, labor union umbrella organization). The first incidents took place when the "police", started to arrest and search people's rucksacks of those who make uses of the public space in that they pursue to write on walls, and apparently in the demonstration there were real thugs and policmen, being part of the same headquarters, that acted exactly like the Green, if anybody attacked a pro-capitalist symbol with paint bombs or with other objects.

In the Avenida Espana corner Alameda (about 11:25), a micro (bus) of the Green blocked the street and heated up the minds. Slogans against the "police" and first masked up faces.

In Cumming corner Alameda, more radical groups take the street Alameda in northern direction, begin to erect barricade and to spray graffiti. A cctv camera (symbol of law and order) is attacked. A couple of "miguelitos" (nails) on the ground, much water, but everything is calm again, the people of the CUT are behind and don't want to know anything of the other groups.

At the Plaza los Heroes the number of demonstrators has already grown to some thousands, everything is very calm, the demonstration from the northern zone at (street corner Independencia / Recoleta) arrives. The silence is only of short duration, barricades and repression, much police, a "zorillo" (police vehicle for tears gas) blinds me and another comrade of indymedia for a moment, a car burns for a couple of moment and apparantly in a side-street a "zapatilla" (prisoner transport vehicle) was attacked in the same manner. Multiple explosions.


The demo arrives at the headquarters of the CUT, barricades are erected in the Alameda and the nearby streets. Two "guanacos" (water cannon) approach in front of the CUT, much police, tears gas granades, batons, etc. The demonstrators withdraw further west each time and to the nearby streets. Permanent clashes, that barricade at the corner Amunategui Alameda are removed by the police, further barricades are erected, but they all suffer the same fate. The CUT offices is under siege, many people inside, "pacos" try to penetrate, however they withdraw because of stones and various objects, many arrests, and much water, police lines on both sides, maybe pretending to raid? About 5 green micros surround the zone, the press is runnning in front of the ZentralBandejon while many people in the zone are surrounded.
After a couple of minutes, the people come individually out of the labor union office and thereby everything is getting calm again.


The "third commissariat of Santiago", reports about 140 arrests, who are released gradually from 18:30 onwards, but not everyone has the same "good luck", because 2 of them are handed over to the military courts with the accusation "tried destruction of a ... police bus" , apparantly this strike was much more protest than anything else, which shows, that the CUT has not the dominance regarding the representation and defense of the interests of the workers, that it claims to have.


More Pictures: [1, 2, 3]
coordination for translations;
more information: Imc Chile.