Scotland all out for G8 security

GLENEAGLES, Scotland, July 6 (Xinhuanet) — The streets of Edinburgh looked quite normal on Wednesday except a heavy presence of police and some boarded up shop windows in downtown areas. With the fast-approaching Group of Eight (G8) summit in Gleneagles some70 kilometers way from the Scottish capital, Scotland is all drummed up to ensure a safe summit.

On Monday, violent clashes took place on a high street of Edinburgh when over 1,000 anarchists and members of the so-called Carnival for Full Enjoyment group threw stones, bricks and bottles at anti-riot police, bringing the city center to a total standstill. About 100 were arrested and more than a dozen injured, including some police officers.

Realizing that some people are here bent on trouble and violence, the Scottish police vowed Tuesday to be "firm" if they encounter similar situations during a protest planned at the start of the summit on Wednesday.

"We want to allow the peaceful protest of the majority to take place unhindered by any rogue elements who are set on disruption and confrontation," said Chief Constable John Vine of the Tayside police which is in charge of the security around the Gleneagles area.

"We will not flinch where we encounter such behavior and will deal with it in a robust and measured way," he added.

By far, police have been acting in a restrained manner toward protesters. In the largest rally ever seen in the city last Saturday with some 22,000 people participating in the "Make Poverty History" march, over 1,000 police officers were deployed to keep order, giving directions and taking photos of those who were likely to cause trouble.

"The rally was very peaceful except a small incident which was contained shortly. We were very happy about this," a police spokesman said.

Security concerns have brought many events to a halt as Irish singer Bob Geldof called for one million people to lodge the "Long March to Justice" to Edinburgh when political leaders of the world’s biggest industrialized nations meet at the G8 summit on Wednesday.

Queen Elizabeth II has scrapped her annual summer holiday in Edinburgh for fear of the G8 protest marches in the city. Both the Scottish Parliament building and the nearby royal palace of Holyrood house have been cordoned off from June 29 June to July 9 and closed to the public.

Security around the summit venue is even more strict. The Gleneagles Hotel where the summit to be held and the golf course around it have been encircled with a five-mile long steel fence. Close-circuit TV has been equipped in air balloons around the hotel and around the media center several hundred meters away. No photographs are allowed to take of the hotel except by accredited photographers at a prescribed time on Wednesday.

Security measures at checkpoints near the media center where around 3,000 reporters are said to cover the event are strict. Reporters boarding shuttle buses have to be checked several times on the way to the center for press IDs.

According to a press officer with the Tayside Police, a 11,000-strong police force has been deployed for security enforcement around the G8 summit. About 6,000 of them are from England and Wales, while the rest all come from Scotland, taking up about two-thirds of the total Scottish police force.

These include special firearm police deployed near the summit venue, as well as police on horse-back and guard-dog unit, which makes 3,000 the number stationed in Gleneagles alone.

Steward Wilson with the Scottish Police Information and Coordination Center said he wanted to assure the public that the police would be able to "deploy and allocate resources as the need develops" over this week.

"We have enormous resources in terms of people, 10,000 officers, and support from helicopters, specialist search teams and the normal resources that the police have available," he added.

But Wilson noted that the policing operation would not have at its disposal either water canons or tear gas to disperse protesters.

The summit has been targeted by various protest groups.

On Wednesday, G8 Alternatives, a multi-sectored organization against war, poverty, climate change and capitalism, planned to stage a rally in Auchterarder, some 500 meters from Gleneagles, to pressure leaders from the world’s richest countries to take action and heed public concerns.

British newspapers have been speculating on the security costs for policing the summit at somewhere 120 million pounds.

However, there has been no such figure given, with officials dismissing it as depending greatly on the circumstances of protests.

Scottish First Minister Jack McConnell insisted that the positive publicity for Scotland from the G8 summit will far outweigh the security costs.

In advertising terms, he said, the worldwide impact of the event would be worth 10 times the cost of staging the summit.

"The G8 is a tremendous opportunity for Scotland. I am absolutely certain that with the potential benefits to Scotland of way over 500 million pounds the costs incurred will be costs that are entirely justified," McConnell said.

It is reported that hosting the summit will cost the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office 10 million pounds and British Chancellor Gordon Brown has pledged the Scottish Executive 20 million pounds toward policing costs.

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