The windows of the Belize Bank (belonging to Sir Michael Ashcroft?s Carlisle Holdings) and those of William Quan, to a lesser extent, were broken, apparently with huge rocks.

The Police Department reports that nine police officers and four civilians were injured, among them three civilians who were shot and one who was stabbed. Commissioner of Police, Gerald Westby, told the media that it was not the police who shot the civilians.

At the time that the riot broke out downtown, police were nowhere in sight. Riot squads and other policemen and Belize Defense Force (BDF) officers began arriving on the scene about a half hour after the looting began?this is despite several media reports that warned that a mob was headed down to Albert Street.

The riot was quelled by a reinforced team of Belize City police officers, who had sought the back up of out-district police officers, as well as BDF soldiers. Most of the officers were stationed at the Queen Street Police Station, a stone?s throw away from Independence Hall, where a group of prominent and high-ranking PUP officials were meeting.

This was the first such destruction of private property and looting since the Heads of Agreement riots in 1981?twenty-four years ago, when a series of riots provoked a state of emergency in Belize. The Heads of Agreement was a document that was drafted in London and signed by three PUP Government Ministers to settle Guatemala?s unresolved territorial claim over Belize. The protesters viewed the agreement as a sell-out of Belize.

Today?s downtown riot occurred hours after a crowd of students, teachers and other demonstrators blocked off Belcan Bridge just at the evening?s rush hour, and faced-off a team of about 25 uniformed police officers, with a sizeable number of plain clothes officers standing in the vicinity. (See story ? Students block Belcan Bridge, on the front page.)

As the police attempted to leave the scene at the bridge, demonstrators pelted them with broken bottles, rocks and broken pieces of concrete. Demonstrators later lit piles of tires at both approaches to the bridge and when the tires were almost burned out, a crowd of demonstrators headed downtown to Albert Street.

At the junction of Orange Street and Euphrates Avenue, a stack of tires and a scooter were burned, and within the hour the scooter had smoldered to its mere frame and the tires were charred to almost nothing.

By the time Amandala arrived on East Canal Street near downtown Belize City at about 7:45 p.m., we were informed that Hofius was being looted and Brodies, belonging to the Prime Minister?s brother ? Billy Musa, was next. It was clear to us that the people who were looting and vandalizing the stores were not the same group of students, educators and workers who had blockaded the Belcan Bridge.

The events grew critical at about 8:00 p.m., when the small detachment of riot police, numbering about 15 to 20, were seen advancing down Albert Street, coming from its northern end, in the vicinity of the Swing Bridge.

The law enforcement squad was not enough to contain the mob of rioters who had already broken into several Albert Street stores, including Brodies, Hofius, and Miami Fashions, by the time the riot police arrived on the scene, fitted with helmets, body shields, clubs and guns. The squad advanced on a small crowd that was scattered on Albert Street, but the crowd retreated and was soon out of our view.

While the riot squad stood near the junction of Albert and South Streets, another group of looters were breaking into Gaylord Store on King Street, which leads off Albert Street, and a crowd of people gathered around, some venturing inside to loot merchandize even while the store?s alarm jangled. The adjacent Record Shack store was untouched.

Hofius was reportedly the first store to be struck that night: the second was Brodies. Venus Photo and Records was another major Albert Street/Bishop Street store that was vandalized. Looters made off with cameras, cell phones, and number of other electronic items.

A half an hour after the riot began, police officers began to detain looters, and by 10:30 p.m., about 100 people, some women but mostly men and boys, were hauled off to the Queen Street Police Station.

Even as a beefed up troop of police and BDF officers stood ready and on guard at the Queen Street Police Station, rioters had tried, on at least three occasions, to break into nearby stores?two instances in the vicinity of the Majestic Alley, a stone?s throw from the police station, and the third at the junction of Hyde?s Lane and New Road, an Arab store. As far as we are aware, police did not apprehend anyone in respect of these instances, but confiscated a bicycle that was abandoned in the alley near the Angelus Press?s Business Machines Center.

After our newspaper left the scene well after 10:00 p.m., we crossed back to the Southside of town, across the BelChina Bridge, and observed a group of people cleaning up pieces of broken glass that were scattered all over the Texaco Food Mart and gas station, located just below the bridge. The storeowner had reportedly just left the store moments before vandals moved in and broke though the store?s glass walls. A computer was evidently damaged and the shelves cleared of some snack items, some of which littered the splinter-covered floor. The obviously devastated owner told us that he had insurance, but declined to talk about the matter until a later date.

In downtown Belize City, looters hastily made off with footwear, clothes, appliances, CD cases, fans, vacuum cleaners, and a slew of other items. Some of them who were caught were beaten with batons.

We observed that many of those who had been detained by police had been brought in with items such as sneakers and clothes. We noticed police picking up penlight batteries from the back of one of their trucks, which batteries we suppose had been also looted from a store, because of the quantity we observed.

Police told many of the detainees to ?carry your stuff,? but some of them refused, saying that the stuff did not belong to them.

A man and two women who had been detained were released moments after they walked into the station. They insisted that they were merely sitting behind a downtown bank when police apprehended them. The police had taken out a box, apparently filled with footwear, from inside the police vehicle in which the three detainees were taken to the station, and had ordered the group to carry the box?insisting that it was theirs?but they refused and maintained their innocence.

Notably, many of the detainees are young Black men, but we noticed a pubescent boy also being taken to the station for lockdown.

While the police were transporting people suspected to be looters to the station, an ambulance passed in front of the station and the driver said that there was an injured policeman inside. A police substation on Vernon Street, in the Mayflower area, had reportedly been attacked during the time of the riot, and one officer, Police Constable Jerry Usher, who, police said, had gone to the aid of off-duty officers, had suffered a broken arm and facial injuries and was transported to the hospital via ambulance.

The downtown Belize City looting and the blockade of the Belcan Bridge came on the heels of turmoil at what many have described as one of Belize?s most lucrative establishments in the country ? the Belize Telecommunications Limited, and a five-day telecommunications shutdown.

Only yesterday, the Opposition United Democratic Party (UDP) held a press conference to announce that it would pressure the current Said Musa administration into resigning with a series of acts of ?civil disobedience.?

The past seven days have been full of unpredictable events. It began with a ?bomb threat? at the Belize Telecommunications Limited?s Esquivel Telecom Center, which forced a short evacuation of workers. At the same time, workers increased their agitation for 37% shareholding in the company?for which business magnates, American Jeffrey Prosser and British Sir Michel Ashcroft, are vying for control.

On the morning of Friday, April 15, a nationwide shutdown of the telecommunications system occurred and the system had stayed that way until mid-afternoon today, Wednesday, when some of our sources say that workers were forced to repair the system, under the watchful eye of gun-toting police.

Even while the telecommunications system was restored, there were partial outages of water and electricity.

This Wednesday afternoon, April 20, a mass of students of the University of Belize initiated unrest when they stormed the campus of St. John?s College and invited the students to join them in a demonstration in front of the Belize Telecommunications Limited and a few blocks away, at the Prime Minister?s home corner Princess Margaret Drive and ?E? Street.

At about 4:00 p.m., after hours in the hot sun and confrontation with the police, the students decided to leave the area, but then marched to the Belcan Bridge, where some parked their cars and blocked traffic until after 7:00 tonight. No one was detained or arrested in this unrest.

Some time after that blockade ended, the riot broke out in downtown Belize City. It was during this riot that the police began detaining people suspected of looting and vandalizing.