Quebec police admit they went undercover at Montebello protest
Last Updated: Thursday, August 23, 2007 | 7:52 PM ET
CBC News
Quebec provincial police admitted Thursday that three of their officers disguised themselves as demonstrators during the protest at the North American leaders summit in Montebello, Que.
A YouTube video shows Dave Coles, president of the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union, ordering three masked men back from a line of riot police.
(CBC)
However, the police force denied allegations its undercover officers were there on Monday to provoke the crowd and instigate violence.
"At no time did the police of the Sûreté du Québec act as instigators or commit criminal acts," the police force said in French in a news release. "It is not in the police force's policies, nor in its strategies, to act in that manner.
"At all times, they responded within their mandate to keep order and security."
Police said the three undercover officers were only at the protest to locate and identify non-peaceful protesters in order to prevent any incidents.
Police came under fire Tuesday, when a video surfaced on YouTube that appeared to show three plainclothes police officers at the protest with bandanas across their faces. One of the men was carrying a rock.
In the video, protest organizers in suits order the men to put the rock down, call them police instigators and try unsuccessfully to unmask them.
Police-issued boots identified fake protesters
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