Ring of steel keeps demos away from world leaders

HUNDREDS of police officers formed a ring of steel around the Excel Centre today as protesters swarmed around the site.

Around 400 demonstrators holding placards and banners staged a mass protest several hundred yards away from the G20 summit.

Helicopters circled the area as world leaders arrived. Marine police units were on standby on the Royal Victoria Dock and snipers were placed on top of a 20-storey apartment building.

Riot police were also on standby as the force feared a repeat of yesterday's violence when anarchists hijacked peaceful demonstration marches in the City.

Climate Camp activists, Stop the War campaigners and the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament demonstrators were among the crowds on day two of the protests. Dan Morgan, 28, a student from Leytonstone, said: "We won't pay for their crisis. Enough is enough. We are determined that they hear our message loud and clear."

Some protesters complained that police were not allowing them near the centre. Long-time peace campaigner Lindsey German, the convenor of the Stop the War Coalition, said: "I think it's rubbish. I can understand issues with security when you've got all these people here, but I don't understand why we are not allowed to protest outside the Excel Centre.

"We are absolutely miles away and I believe that really is not acceptable."

Around 1,500 police officers were involved in a military-style operation to protect the Excel as delegations were escorted in police convoys.

In the City trouble flared at the London Stock Exchange this morning as protesters, equipped with paint and climbing gear, tried to scale a monument in Paternoster Square. Two were arrested and the Stock Exchange opened without a hitch as about 100 officers circled the entrance to the building.

This morning an army of cleaners set to work in the Square Mile to clean up graffiti and slogans left by yesterday's protests while shops re-opened for business.

Today it emerged that police had come under a barrage of missiles as they tried to save the life of a man who collapsed during a protest near the Bank of England last night.

The officers were hit by bottles thrown from the crowd and were forced to carry the man to a safe location to give him mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. An ambulance crew then took the man to hospital, where he died.

An independent investigation has been ordered into the death of the man, who was in his forties. He had been found slumped in an alley off Cornhill after suffering a suspected heart attack.Police are investigating reports that he was an innocent by-stander who got caught up in the trouble.

The man, shaven headed and in a Millwall football club shirt and tracksuit trousers, lived in the City. The incident has been referred to the Independent Police Complaints Commission.

A witness claimed that protesters came to the aid of the man, and that just a few plastic bottles were thrown by people further back in the crowd who did not realise what was happening.

Fran Legg, a politics student at Queen Mary, University of London, said her friend went to help the man and put him in the recovery position. About eight riot police arrived with police medics and stood around him. She said by the time police medics took over from her friend, the man had fallen unconscious. Elias Stoakes, 25, also a student at Queen Mary, said: "There were a lot of people around him trying to help an d asking for medics. One or maybe two plastic bottles were thrown, but it was by people further back in the crowd who did not know what was going on. There definitely wasn't a rain of bottles."

Police said they had made more than 90 arrests during the protests, which have seen anarchists smashing the windows of an RBS bank branch in Threadneedle Street, and 5,000 people laying siege to the Bank of England.

Sixteen protesters were held for violent disorder and one man for suspected arson after he allegedly attempted to set light to the RBS branch.

Thirty people were injured during the protests yesterday, three of them police officers. Today police were braced for a series of separate demonstrations, mostly based around the summit meeting at the Excel centre. The Stop the War Coalition, British Muslim Initiative, Campaign For Nuclear Disarmament and others said they were planning protests near the Docklands centre. The Free Tibet group, which was planning to lobby the Chinese delegation, while another group, Youth Fight for Jobs, marched to the Excel centre from the City.

A group of masked anarchists was believed to be at the centre of yesterday's violence. One reporter described how he had attended meetings of the Whitechapel Anarchist Group, which claimed to be taking orders from University of East London professor Chris Knight. Early today police moved on the last of the Climate Camp demonstrators attempting to block Bishopsgate. The group had set up tents in the street and was staging a mainly peaceful protest.

City bosses today praised the Met's handling of the G20 protests yesterday, describing it as "a tricky job very well done". Stuart Fraser, of the City of London Corporation, said: "The police are managing a very difficult balancing act: they need to make sure the demonstrators can protest peacefully and safely, while protecting property and keeping the City open for business. "

Met Commander Simon O'Brien said: "The majority wanted to protest lawfully but there was a small element who were hell-bent on hijacking that."