[7/1/01 - SALZBURG, Austria - AP] With helicopters circling overhead, riot police clad in black, full-body armor faced off against masked protesters Sunday as European political and business leaders opened an economic summit.
Hundreds of activists tried to break through walls of police as they marched on the meeting hall where the European Economic Summit was beginning. At least two protesters and one police officer were injured.
Inside the convention center, political and business leaders pledged to continue European Union enlargement, even as anti-globalization protesters showered police with bottles on the streets outside.
At one point riot police charged the crowd with batons swinging after demonstrators pelted them with sticks and bottles.
Press reports estimate that nearly 5,000 police were called to strengthen security in Salzburg.
The extra precautions come after street fighting left 70 people injured last month at the European Union summit in Goteborg, Sweden, and similar riots injured 32 people at an anti-World Bank rally last weekend in Barcelona, Spain.
Despite the scuffles, it was business as usual inside the gleaming convention hall built especially for the summit. The event, hosted by the World Economic Forum and chaired by billionaire financier George Soros, runs through Tuesday.
Topping the agenda Sunday was the issue of EU enlargement.
Nearly all panelists, mostly from central and eastern Europe, applauded the breakthrough agreement last month in Sweden, where the European Union agreed to admit new members from the formerly communist east by 2004.
``Nobody questioned the idea of enlargement,'' said Guenter Verheugen, the European commissioner overseeing the complex entry negotiations. ``For the 15 member states, it's strategic objective Number One. For candidate countries, it's a light at the end of the tunnel.''
Representatives from candidate countries remained upbeat that their membership bids would not be delayed by a June 7 Irish vote rejecting the treaty that prepares the way for expansion. But they also warned that EU leaders and candidate countries need to try harder to sell enlargement to their citizens.
Hungary, Poland, Slovenia, the Czech Republic, Cyprus and Estonia are expected to be the first to join the European Union. Slovakia, Malta, Latvia and Lithuania -- which started talks later -- are also making good progress.
Verheugen said Sunday that all candidates except Romania and Bulgaria have a shot at joining the European Union as early as 2004.
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[posted 7/8/01]
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