I'm not really a veteran of a lot of protest action. But I've heard a few stories about police using provocateurs to disrupt peaceful protests, to give them an excuse to break out the hats and bats and bust the entire event.
Guess what. Near the North American integration summit in Montebello, Quebec, three cops were caught dead to rights attempting to turn a peaceful protest into a riot.
TheStar.com: Police accused of using provocateurs at North American summit
A video, posted on YouTube, shows three young men, their faces masked by bandannas, mingling Monday with protesters in front of a line of police in riot gear. At least one of the masked men is holding a rock in his hand.
The three are confronted by protest organizer Dave Coles, president of the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union of Canada. Coles makes it clear the masked men are not welcome among his group of protesters, whom he describes as mainly grandparents. He urges them to leave and find their own protest location.
Coles also demands that they put down their rocks. Other protesters begin to chime in that the three are really police agents. Several try to snatch the bandanas from their faces.
Rather than leave, the three actually start edging closer to the police line, where they appear to engage in discussions. They eventually push their way past an officer, whereupon other police shove them to the ground and handcuff them.
Late Tuesday, photographs taken by another protester surfaced, showing the trio lying prone on the ground. The photos show the soles of their boots adorned by yellow triangles. A police officer kneeling beside the men has an identical yellow triangle on the sole of his boot.
Like I wrote earlier, they were caught dead to rights. Doing what? Picking up rocks, acting menacingly, in order to disrupt a peaceful protest. These police wanted to end the peaceful protest, by creating an excuse for the men in hats and bats to strike violently. Let me emphasize that: The police, before the day started, wanted to violently attack a peaceful protest. They wanted to engage in a police riot, to hurt these people, and they had a few of their men dress up in bandannas and act like hooligans just to give them an excuse.
Looks like later that day, possibly because of idiots, or possibly because of other provocateurs, the police got an excuse for their riot, and cut loose with the pepper spray, tear gas and rubber bullets.
Wow. I don't know what to say. I'm at my wits end.
EDIT: After a bit of looking, I found the picture of the boots mentioned in the article:
Link: Provocateur's boots image.
If you click on the link, you can click on the image and get it blown up to very high resolution. It's not yellow triangles on the boots, it's a yellow insignia. At the high resolution, it's very clear that the riot cop that's kneeling, and the provocateurs are wearing the exact same brand of boot.