Copenhagen December Riot - 16th December 2006 Demonstration

16th December 2006 Demonstration

After the appeal made to the supreme court was rejected an ultimatum was set for the users of Ungdomshuset. The ultimatum stated that the users had until 14 December 2006 to leave the house. If not the police would be called in to evict the house by force. A peaceful solution to the conflict now seemed to be impossible. The users of Ungdomshuset started to mobilize for a physical defense of the house. In December they called for three days of actions and demonstrations starting on 14 December. These included a demonstration on December 16th.

At the same time, a communique was sent out to supporters from the rest of Europe calling on them to come to Copenhagen and help defend the house. The communique was called "Troublemakers of the world unite!". Ungdomshuset had experienced a lot of foreign support from squatters and left wing radicals across Europe, and a lot of those now prepared to come to Copenhagen to participate in the demonstration. The demonstration were to meant to mark the end of the three days of action. The day before on December 15th, thousands of people had marched peacefully through downtown Copenhagen and the protests had been peaceful up until then.

Late in the afternoon on December 16th people started to gather at Ungdomshuset. The police were patrolling heavily in the area and vans of riot police had been spotted in the streets around Ungdomsuset. At about 5pm, around 1,200 demonstrators had gathered at Ungdomshuset. The demonstrators were all wearing black clothes and most of them had masked their faces with balaclavas or bandannas and hoods. The front block of the demonstration were also wearing crash-helmets and were armed with clubs, iron bars and homemade shields.

At about 5.30pm, the demonstration started to move down Jagtvej towards the neighborhood of Frederiksberg. The demonstration had only moved about 300 meters when the police moved in and blocked it. The police surrounded the demonstrators with armoured cars. Loudspeakers then declared the demonstration illegal and ordered the demonstrators to disperse. The demonstrators responded by bombarding the police with fireworks, cobblestones, and bottles filled with paint. The police used armoured cars to split the main body of demonstrators into smaller groups. The demonstrators then moved downtown and vandalized a number of shops. The police used tear gas to disperse the demonstrators. By the end of the day the police had arrested 300 demonstrators.

• Ungdomshuset seen from the street

• Burning barricade build during the riot

• Tree used as a roadblock

• At one point the riot turned in to a pitched battle between protesters and police