SEATTLE -- Stunned by violent street protests, delegates to a 135-nation trade gathering insisted they would push ahead Wednesday with efforts to launch a new round of talks aimed at breaking down barriers to global commerce -- and city officials vowed to back them up.
President Clinton was scheduled to address ministers Wednesday in the conference he has been banking on heavily, but he was heading into a trashed downtown where officials sought to restore order with an overnight curfew and officers in riot gear.Washington Gov. Gary Locke ordered as many as 200 members of the National Guard and 300 state troopers to the city, where they will serve as backup to police who battled rampaging protesters with tear gas and pepper spray Tuesday.
Wednesday, city officials declared a no-protest zone for nearly all of the city's downtown core, about 50 city blocks, acknowledging they were caught unaware by the magnitude of the disturbance.
"Clearly, in hindsight, the approach we used yesterday did not work and we're going to have to take a different approach today," Assistant Police Chief Ed Joiner told a news conference.
Police, who arrested 68 people Tuesday, moved in swiftly Wednesday morning to break up pockets of demonstrators and arrest them, bringing in transit buses to take them away. Most of the protesters were nonviolent, going limp as police tried to pick them up.
"This conference will be a success. The issues are far too important to be ignored," said Mike Moore, director general of the World Trade Organization.
Police Chief Norm Stamper told a news conference: "The downtown area needs to be and will in fact be made safe today for everyone."
Mayor Paul Schell, interviewed on NBC's "Today," said, "I think we've secured the town."
He said Guard troops will "be used primarily for backup. They are not armed. I don't want armed personnel in the streets. I think that might even be more provocative."
WTO delegates long had expected protests but nothing like the storm that hit Seattle when at least 40,000 activists took to the streets on the day the conference was to open. Some 5,000 protesters confronted police, with a handful launching an assault on the downtown business area.
Windows were shattered everywhere from NikeTown to Santa's Village outside of Nordstrom. A Starbucks coffee shop was broken into and looted.
The protests threatened to become a major embarrassment for the Clinton administration. News of the violence generated headlines across Asia today: "Demonstrators overrun Seattle," said a page-one headline in the Times of India, one of India's top national newspapers.
The dissension even surfaced in the presidential campaign. In Nashville, Tenn., at the campaign headquarters of Vice President Al Gore, some 30 protesters gathered to show their dismay with the WTO Tuesday night. There was no violence, although at one point demonstrators entered the reception area and chanted, "No, no, no WTO . . ." to stunned members of Gore's presidential campaign staff.
The protesters are unhappy with the Geneva-based organization that sets the rules for global trade, charging that it too often considers only the needs of giant multinational corporations at the expense of protecting the environment and worker rights.
Disappointed WTO officials scrapped morning speeches Tuesday by Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, and they headed straight into the first of a series of plenary sessions where all the trade ministers are able to air their concerns. Albright flew back to Washington after being unable to give her speech.
Later, as trade ministers dined at a gala miles away, police in body armor and gas masks fired tear gas and pepper spray to clear demonstrators from the downtown core. Hundreds ran choking from heavy clouds of gas. As of early Wednesday, 17 minor injuries were reported, and Schell said 68 people had been arrested.
White House press secretary Joe Lockhart said Clinton "has said that he believes the people there protesting have a legitimate point of view and should be heard inside and outside the hall." While the vast majority of protesters were peaceful, Clinton condemned those who chose violence. "That's wrong," Lockhart said.
Mohammed Asfour, the Jordanian minister of industry and trade, said he was kept away from the opening ceremony Tuesday. "People like us who came from thousands of miles and to find no organization -- it's very sad," Asfour said.
The administration has pushed for the WTO to consider environmental and worker safeguards when trade agreements are negotiated.
"Nobody could be happy about what happened today," said Schell, who apologized to WTO ministers "for their inconvenience." And Stamper defended the response of the Seattle force, saying it showed "remarkable restraint."
The wild protests drew angry responses from some WTO delegates. Colombia's external trade minister, Marta Lucia Ramirez, was jostled and shaken up, officials said, though apparently she was not seriously harmed.
Union members were more orderly, though they brought strong message.
"We're going to change WTO or we're going to get rid of WTO," said James P. Hoffa, president of the Teamsters union. The union throngs stayed to their designated parade route, finishing their march without incident.