File Photo: Demonstrators clash with police during a protest in Westminster in central London December 9, 2010 (Photo: Reuters)
British newspapers published videos on Thursday showing violence apparently committed by police against protesting students at the University of London Union the day before.
Students at the university have been protesting the closure of the union by the university's administration.
On Wednesday, police forces evicted a group of students who had occupied part of the headquarters of the University of London Senate House. Several protesters told London papers that the police had used violence against them.
British police, along with the university's private security staff, arrested five protesters, including one who suspected of assaulting an officer. A Metropolitan police spokesman told the Guardian that 36 arrests were made.
Stating that "scores of officers" were involved in such clashes, the Guardian reported, according to students, that police and private security staff were "unnecessarily violent."
One protester said that she "was pushed to the ground" and her "glasses smashed into three pieces."
Another protester told the Independent that students were punched and officers pulled their hair and clothes as they rushed towards the gates of the building.
"The level of police force that we have seen in the last couple of days is totally unprecedented on university campuses. It appears pre-planned. It is as if they are reacting to a riot situation – taking the level of force – and using it against students protesting on a university campus," the president of the University of London Union, Michael Chessum, told the Guardian.
Chessum said on Twitter that the eviction of the occupying students was "one of the nastiest, most brutal I've seen on campus in a long time."
The University of London Union released a statement, according to the Independent, in which it said that it was still investigating what happened but that "reports indicate protesters were assaulted by both police and security, thrown to the ground, kicked and punched, and dragged to the ground by their hair."
"Occupations are a legitimate form of dissent. When our university shuts down our student union, and are utterly unaccountable to the students and staff that give it life and make it function, students have no choice but to gain leverage in whatever way they can," the newspaper quoted the statement as saying.
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