The Observer :
English fan stabbed
in Copenhagen
Football Unlimited staff Wednesday
May 17, 2000 (Over de rellen op dinsdag avond)
Arsenal have
offered supporters on official club trips to tonight's Uefa Cup final a full
refund if they do not wish to travel to Copenhagen after an English football
fan was stabbed during running battles between Galatasaray and Arsenal supporters.
The fan was stabbed
in the early hours of this morning after a series of clashes outside bars near
the City Hall Square. But Copenhagen police spokesman Superintendent Flemming
Munch told reporters the wound was not life-threatening. "He has been seriously
injured, but he will survive," he said. "We believe he may have been hit in
the lung. "
Police said that seven people were injured in the trouble, four English and
three Turkish, but all - apart from the stab victim - suffered minor injuries.
Arsenal's offer
of a refund was made in a handwritten note given to every supporter as they
checked in this morning to catch one of their official flights to the Danish
capital. The note, which had been written on Arsenal's headed paper and was
handed out by club officials, said: "If any supporter travelling on an official
club trip does now not wish to travel to Copenhagen, the club will give a full
refund."
Twelve fans opted
to stay in England, but the vast majority of the 2,000 supporters scheduled
to fly out today decided to attend the game in the Parken Stadium. Arsenal spokeswoman
Amanda Docherty claimed that the club felt it was right to make the offer. She
said: "Some people obviously now do not wish to go to the match so therefore
it's only right and fair to give them a full refund. The stabbing was an isolated
incident and we have been through the city today and the supporters are mixing
in the main square and everybody is fine.
" Last night's
fighting broke out at about 1am when dozens of Turkish fans attacked the Absalom,
a disco bar, in which fans of the north London club had been spending much of
the evening. Police in riot gear moved in quickly and the mob began running
around the square, approaching another bar, called the Scottish Pub, where one
fan hurled a glass at its doors. When a lull developed in the fighting, the
stab victim received extensive treatment on the road in a main thoroughfare
leading off the square.
Concerned Arsenal
fans knelt on the ground around him, using their shirts to staunch the flow
of blood, before an ambulance eventually came to take him to hospital. There
followed a further attack on the Absalom, and with the situation still unresolved,
a gang of 40 Arsenal fans advanced towards their Turkish rivals and a confrontation
quickly broke out. The fans chased each other across the centre of the square
and an attack broke out on a bar and restaurant called Rosie McGee's. All hell
broke loose as missiles of all kinds were thrown by Turks at the bar and returned
by the English who had rushed to its doors. Bottles, glasses and bicycles flew
through the night air as the battle raged. Again police were quickly on the
scene, and officers in full riot gear interposed themselves between the warring
factions and officers with dogs finally brought the fighting to an end.
Police said eight
men were arrested - four Britons and four Turks - after the scuffles. Supt Andy
Smith, who travelled with the Arsenal fans from north London, said: "I am very
sad and distressed to hear of this incident. It has spoiled what had been up
until now a very relaxed and good atmosphere." Later, a Danish police spokesman
said: "We had hoped this would not happen but are not shocked that it has, because
it was something we had expected more or less. We hope for the best later today."
He also said that despite last night's violence the police would stick to their
preparations, and had no plans to close the bars in the city centre.
Renewed fighting breaks out
in Copenhagen (Rellen woensdag)
English fan stabbed in Copenhagen
again and one ear ripped off
Sean Ingle Wednesday May 17, 2000
A second Arsenal fan has been
stabbed and another has had part of his ear ripped off after renewed fighting
broke out in the centre of Copenhagen earlier this afternoon.
A police officer said that an
English supporter had been stabbed in the stomach with a knife by a man of Turkish
origin during fierce skirmishes between Arsenal and Galatasaray fans. Another
ten people were taken to hospital with minor injuries - including a man who
was bleeding profusely after having half his ear ripped off.
The violence erupted around mid-afternoon
in Radhuspladsen Square, after rowdy fans started hurling bottles, chairs and
bicycles at each other. A few minutes later a full-scale riot broke up with
running skirmishes between the two sets of supporters. Witnesses told of how
at the height of the fighting, groups of English fans beat up individual Turks
and used weapons such as iron bars. The owner of a snackbar on the square said
a group of people wearing Galatasaray jerseys attacked an English fan with a
cafe chair which was still bloody from the night before - the fan was taken
away in an ambulance.
A Turkish cameraman was also
injured in the fighting. Few police were on the square when the violence began,
but they appeared shortly afterwards and managed to quell the riot by firing
tear gas and releasing dogs. For most of the morning both sets of supporters
seemed to be mingling peacefully. But around 3pm local time gangs of fans chanting
"England, England" started hurling missiles and wielding sticks at Galatasaray
fans.
The Arsenal fans were gathered
outside a bar called the Palace Hotel when riot police moved in to disperse
them and they fled down the street from the officers, who had batons drawn.
A few minutes later a full-scale riot broke out. Missiles of every kind, including
chairs snatched from the centre of the square, were hurled and the English fans
put the Turkish supporters to flight. They then trapped a small number of Galatarasay
fans at the top of steps leading up to the city hall before police managed to
drive riot vans between the raging English mob and the trapped Turks.
Police then fired tear gas which
had supporters from both sides fleeing and choking, with their eyes weeping,
and for a while the situation calmed down. The fighting later moved to the street
off the main square. English fans clashed with the riot police, who pushed them
along the broad boulevard into a square where they contained them and a fragile
calm descended. Shadow culture, media and sport minister Peter Ainsworth said:
"This behaviour from fans of both teams is utterly disgraceful and I hesitate
to use the words football fans in this case. "It is sheer hooliganism and this
behaviour has sadly overshadowed this competition, which should have been a
celebration of football. "The news of the running battles in Copenhagen, in
which innocent and genuine football fans and families have found themselves
trapped, fuels the concerns I have over the suitability of Charleroi for the
high-profile England versus Germany Euro 2000 fixture on June 17. "Questions
need to be answered as to how these hooligans were able to travel there in the
first place. Urgent lessons need to be learnt before the first ball kicks off
in Euro 2000." Approximately 2,000 officers - 20 percent of Denmark's total
police force - have been called up for tonight's match, and 1.7 miles of fencing
has been erected to keep British and Turkish supporters apart.
Stabbed Arsenal fan says he was an inch
from death
Football Unlimited
and agencies Wednesday May 17, 2000
Arsenal fan Paul Dineen, 41, who was stabbed
during the first outbreak of violence, said today from his hospital bed that
doctors told him he was an inch from death when the knife was plunged in his
back.
Mr Dineen, from Edgware, north London,
said he still hoped to get to tonight's Uefa Cup final if he was well enough
to travel. He told how he initially thought he had been punched when he was
stabbed near Rosie McGee's bar, just off the large Radhuspladsen square in the
city. "There was pandemonium going on, bottles, glasses and bicycles being thrown
around, and suddenly I felt what I thought was a punch in the back. Then I felt
liquid - blood - and fell to the ground. I was in unbearable pain as my friends
helped me, and I thought I was going to die." "I don't know if it hit my lung
but I was told I was one inch away from death." Mr Dineen added: "After what
happened in Istanbul [when two Leeds United fans were stabbed to death on the
eve of the semi-final first leg] and now this, I think the Turks should definitely
be thrown out of the competition, without a shadow of a doubt. How long is it
going to go on? "The policing last night was non-existent. On a high profile
occasion like this, you need firm but fair policing, with a lot of officers
out and about, and I'm sure in Italy or France that would have happened."