Thats their usual tactic. It also kicked off the same as genoa and also oagreaves by the police riot squads wading into people.
Having checked some of the anarchy sites with pics etc:
Apparantly the main thing kicked off with THREE people occupying the standard life building. The usual response to this is to wait around half an hour with maybe 10cops to see if people get bored and eventually leave, being arrested/cautioned if theyve commited breach of the peace. What did the cops do? 12 van loads of riot cops along with a charge by mounted police to the area.
not heavy handed at all
as to the flowers thign I mentioned earlier apparantly a group returned later on and replanted some more flowers and watered them so its all good.
Later on local youths also waded into the cops, it was a very strange combination, they were urging the anarchists not to go near McDs etc but then teaming up toi defend the anarchists from the police assaults.
Early on in the day the police arrested the volunteer medics who were there to treat any injuries as well, thats the kind of "protecting safety" that was going on. Apparantly setting up a medic van to treat people who are hurt is against the law