Commissioner
Australian
Federal Police
GPO
Box 401
Canberra
ACT 2601
Dear
Commissioner,
We
wish to strongly protest the actions of the Australian Federal Police towards
the demonstration for Burmese democracy at the Burmese Embassy on Friday May 4th.
The
response of the AFP was excessive from the beginning, involving as it did the
mobilisation of countless police, including some in full riot gear, dogs,
mounted police and plain clothes agents.
Members
of the demonstration tried to burn a Burmese dictatorship flag, their own
property. The police responded by
charging into the crowd with fire extinguishers, provoking a short scuffle
between police in full riot gear and protestors, a number of whom were injured.
This
action was unwarranted, given the harmless nature of the flag-burning, which is
a regular occurrence at these demonstrations.
Given
the links between the Australian Federal Police and the Burmese SPDC
dictatorship, highlighted by the recent visit of an AFP delegation to Rangoon
headed by yourself, the actions of the police at the demonstration were
inappropriate and raise questions about the ‘neutrality’ of the AFP.
In
a context where the SPDC regime refuses to conduct meaningful dialogue with the
democratically elected Committee Representing the People’s Parliament, any
‘engagement’ by the AFP or other government agencies with the Burmese junta
undermines serious efforts for peace and democracy. It also helps to legitimise a brutal regime that abuses basic
human rights, engages in slave labour on a massive scale, conducts a war
against its own people and is complicit in the international heroin trade.
When
protestors calling for basic human rights are provoked and attacked by riot
police in the streets of Canberra, people are justified in asking whether the
AFP exists to defend the law or to defend the government and corporate
interests that dictate a policy of ‘engagement’ with murderers like the SPDC.
We
call upon your organisation to end all ties with the SPDC regime, and apologise
to the Burmese community for the attack on the May 4th
demonstration. We further support calls
by the Free Burma Action Committee and others, including ACT Legislative
Assembly member Wayne Berry and ACT Trades and Labour Council secretary Jeremy
Pyner, for a parliamentary review into the AFP program in Burma, and an inquiry
into the AFP attack on the May 4th demonstration.
Yours
sincerely,
Stuart
Munckton, Canberra Resistance branch organiser
James
Vassilopolous, Canberra Democratic Socialist Party branch secretary