Vatican Protesters Evicted by Police

By Tom Kington
The Guardian
January 15, 2012

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jan/15/occupy-vatican-protesters-evicted-police?newsfeed=true

Occupy protesters and police clash in St Peter's Square.

Protesters trying to set up Occupy-style camp in front of St Peter's removed with the support of the Holy See

Demonstrators attempting to set up a protest camp in St Peter's Square in Rome have been forcibly removed by riot police backed by the Vatican.

Aiming to set up a protest camp similar to the Occupy encampment outside St Paul's in London, up to 50 protesters arrived in the colonnaded piazza in front of St Peter's basilica carrying placards calling on the Catholic church to pay more taxes, a likely reference to tax breaks handed to the Vatican by the Italian government.

One of the group of protesters, who were mainly French and Spanish, arrived in a pope's outfit bearing the slogan "indignant heart", a reference to the Spanish Indignados protest movement.

Police moved in when one of the protesters scaled the large Christmas tree standing in the square. Two of the group and one officer were injured in the subsequent scuffle as police in riot gear cleared the demonstrators from the square. Three of the group were detained for identification.

"We put our faith in the Vatican but no one helped us," Julian Garcia, one of the group, told Corriere della Sera. "We were sitting on the ground and they were hitting us with batons."

While the activists outside St Paul's received a mixed reaction from the Church of England, Father Federico Lombardi, a Vatican spokesman, said the Holy See had no doubts about removing the demonstrators before they set up home in St Peter's.

"Considering the actions undertaken and the language used, these Indignados evidently wanted to use the piazza in an improper way, not in keeping with the spirit of the place and it was therefore considered just and opportune to move them out with the co-operation of the police," he said.