On July 31st 2009 Vancouver will be hosting the World Police and Fire Games. The games is an international sporting event where police officers, firefighters, customs and correction officers compete against each other in over 65 sporting events. More than 12,000 police officers, corrections officers and firefighters will be in Vancouver for the 10 day event.

The Anti-Poverty Committee is calling for a mobilization against police brutality both locally and internationally, and the violence that the state perpetrates around the world everyday through police and ‘correctional’ facilities. The APC calls on all those individuals and groups who are against police brutality and the everyday terror and violence caused by the various police forces to participate in actions and events during the police and fire games.

The APC will stand to honor those in our community who have been killed, brutalized, and daily harrased by the police and to condemn not only the individual police forces, but the structure that allows them to get away with oppression, intimidation and violence everyday in our communities.

We believe that the police cannot be made accountable, and they will never truly protect those that they purport to, and that police will never make our communities safer, as they continue to harass, target and brutalize poor people, indigenous people, youth, sex trade workers and many others.

The APC is calling for a demonstration during the opening ceremonies of the games on July 31st at 7pm (location TBA). To get involved in the organizing of the demonstration please contact APC (apc@resist.ca). If your organization would like to endorse the event please email the APC. We also encourage other groups to organize around these events and denounce the police and fire games.