Pauline McCarthy 01.20.09 at 8:40 pm
I was there with my 11 year old son. The one who was arrested or “kidnapped” by the police. I went there with a friend and my son. I have rheumatoid arthritis (leiðagigt) and osteoarthritis (slítgigt) and fibromyalgia (vevjagigt). I could not stand for very long so found a seat in the Parliament garden. I had a red rattle with the siminn sign on it. I just sat there and kept an eye on my son. I told him he could go about banging his cake tin but if there was any trouble he should run to me at the bench.

After about an hour and a half the police decided to move everybody back. When they got to me on the bench I told them that my legs were too painful to walk and I felt safer on the bench. One policeman dragged me off the bench and I ended up on the ground shouting for help. He just walked away. Eventually a policewoman came and helped me back onto the bench.

Bye this time I was in tears. A police photographer came and asked me if I was ok, he was very supportive and kept telling the other 7 or 8 policemen who tried to move me on, every 10 mins or so, that I was disabled and also that I could not understand Icelandic much.
All the while I was keeping an eye on my son. Between the line of police and the building there was only he and I and from where I was sitting it looked like some people lying on the ground behind him. Later on I discovered that they were a group who had been arrested and had their hands tied and sat on the ground.
My son was just standing by the fence just watching the crowd. I saw a group of policemen and women come up to him and talk to him. He pointed at me and I waved him over but they did not bring him to me, the took him to the police station were they striped him to the waist!!! This I found out later as at the time I just thought that they were taking him over to the church or behind the crowd. Not a single one of them came to speak to me. They did not phone me although he gave them my name and number.

My friend was called by his sister and told that she had seen my son being taken away by the police live on the tv. Ras 1.

By this time it was about 4pm and I was almost in a state of shock with pain, as I had forgotten to bring my medicine with me and was frozen to the bone.

So to be honest I was quite relieved when the chief policeman said that now I HAD to leave and they would carry me out. It was clear that the police had decided to make an attack on the crowd, as no other changes had taken place.

A policewoman and a policeman helped me out of the garden to an ambulance man who carted me away on a trolley. About the same time I met my friend and he told me that my son had been arrested. I asked the ambulance man if he could find out where my son was and he told us that he had been taken to the police station in Hverfisgata.

My friend drove me to the police station and because I was in so much pain and difficulty to walk he went in to pick up my son. He was told that I would be reported to the social services child department (barnanefnd).

Later I phoned Rás 1. and told them the story of how the police had taken my son away and not brought him to me. The person who interviewed me on the phone sounded concerned and shocked but she was not in charge of what was reported. As far as my little Icelandic could understand on the news they said that the police took him away to protect him from stone throwers. I never saw a single stone being thrown. Plenty of snowballs though and a few eggs at one time.

At one point a snowball landed by the feet of two policemen, It was blackened with some dirt in it. I watched their body language and I could see that they were trying to find out if there were stones in it, but the kicked it away when the discovered that it was just dirty snow.

From my perch I saw another police officer threatening a man with pepper spray just because he was banging a pot in front of him.

I saw a lot today, too much to write here. I thank you for the opportunity to write in my native English. I feel so cut off from society not being able to speak or understand Icelandic properly. Many people say I should be ashamed to have lived in Iceland for 16 years and still not have a grip on the language. I tell you, if they were in constant pain they would find it very difficult to learn anything never mind another language.

Iceland is a wonderful country and I wish to continue living here with my 2 sons.

LoVe Pauline McCarthy, Akranes