On last day of NATO summit, Chicago braces for more protests after weekend of clashes, arrests

CHICAGO – Demonstrators launched another round of protests Monday in the final hours of the NATO summit, marching through an unusually quiet downtown Chicago to the headquarters of Boeing and President Barack Obama’s re-election campaign.

On the second and last day of the international meeting, the demonstrations were notably smaller than weekend protests that drew thousands into the streets.

A clash following a large protest on Sunday resulted in more than 40 arrests.

Outside Boeing Co.’s headquarters, a relatively small crowd of protesters gathered in the street. Some released red and black balloons and confetti or blew bubbles. Others staged a “die-in,” lying on the ground as if dead.

An orange barricade blocked off the building’s entrances, and dozens of police officers stood guard. A police boat idled in the nearby Chicago River.

Occupy Chicago contends tax breaks for the aircraft manufacturer have deprived the state of millions of dollars. The group also objects to Boeing’s role in producing military hardware for the U.S. and its NATO allies.

Illinois leaders see such tax incentives as a way to attract large companies that bring thousands of jobs.

Targeting Boeing Co.’s Chicago office makes symbolic sense: The company is a major defence contractor that makes fighter jets, bombs and missiles.

But the Chicago office is just the headquarters for a much larger operation. The company employs more than 170,000 people across the United States and in 70 countries. Illinois doesn’t even rank in the top eight states in terms of the number of Boeing employees.

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Boeing’s building was largely deserted Monday because it was among many Chicago companies that told workers to stay home because of the risk of traffic snarls and more protests.

In a statement, protesters seized on that as a victory: “Our call to action shut down the Boeing war machine.”

By mid-afternoon, the protesters were gathered near the building housing Obama’s campaign headquarters, listening to speeches shouted through megaphones. Obama is basing his re-election effort in Chicago, his hometown.

Immigration-rights activists had also planned to go to the small village of Crete, about 35 miles (56 kilometres) south of Chicago, where federal officials are considering building an 800-bed detention facility for illegal immigrants slated for deportation.

For commuters, the threat of more large protests meant navigating numerous transportation changes and tolerating inconvenient security rules.

More than two dozen rail stations were closed along a line that normally carries 14,000 riders in from the south suburbs.

Platforms were being patrolled by a large contingent of law enforcement personnel and K-9 units. The Chicago Transit Authority rerouted 24 buses through a zone that included the lakeside convention centre where world leaders were gathered.

Sunday’s protest march was one of the city’s largest in years, with thousands of people airing grievances about war, climate change, economic inequality and a wide range of other complaints.

But the diversity of opinions also sowed doubts about whether there were too many messages to be effective.

“The issue with the protests here is that everybody is kind of protesting their own thing. There’s not really a solid voice and united message against NATO,” protester Trent Carl said Monday during the demonstration at Boeing headquarters.

Some of the most lasting images of that march were likely to be from a clash at the end, when a small group of demonstrators tried to push beyond a line of police blocking access to the site where world leaders were discussing the war in Afghanistan, European missile defence and other security issues.

Forty-five protesters were arrested and four officers were hurt, including one who was stabbed in the leg, police said.

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Associated Press writers Don Babwin, Ryan J. Foley, Carla K. Johnson, Robert Ray, Jim Suhr, Nomaan Merchant and Michael Tarm contributed to this report.