Yesterday's opening day of the G8 summit in Genoa was marred by violent anti-globablisation protests which claimed the life of one young Italian protester, killed in circumstances that last night remained unclear.
Thirty-nine protesters were arrested while 86 people were injured, two of them critically, on a day when the meeting of the leaders of the world's seven most industrialised countries, plus Russia, was entirely overshadowed by violent unrest.
Earliest reports suggested Carlo Giuliani (23), from Genoa, had been killed when a police teargas canister hit him in the head.
A subsequent Reuters report claimed that he had been shot twice in the head by a policeman after he had thrown a fire extinguisher at a police van.
He died in Via Caffa near Piazza Alimonda, an area outside the high security "Red Zone" surrounding the central Palazzo Ducale, seat of the summit.
Given that the demonstrators almost totally failed to penetrate the "Red Zone", most of yesterday's troubles occurred outside that zone, in the area near to Brignole train station.
Various autonomous and anarchist groups, in particular a group who call themselves "Black Blocks", went on the rampage, smashing shop windows, looting a bank and a computer store as well as setting fire to cars and rubbish bins. This group, a small minority element in the 100,000 strong "Seattle People" movement, here to protest over a wide variety of globalisation and environmental issues, engaged in running battles with the police, responding to tear gas and baton charges by throwing cobble stones. It was in this context that the atmosphere around Piazza Ali monda was inevitably tense by early yesterday evening when the demonstrator was killed.
Genoa has transformed itself into a fortress city for this weekend's summit, in expectation of trouble. Inevitably, however, the major thrust of the security operation has been focussed on the area surrounding the Palazzo Ducale where the government heads are meeting.
While the "Red Zone" remained tranquil and eerily quiet, security forces on more than one occasion found themselves outnumbered outside that inner zone, with one policeman having to fire shots in the air earlier in the afternoon as hundreds of protesters bore down on him. Yesterday's fatal violence overshadowed the first major summit initiative, namely the setting up of a $1 billion World Health Fund, intended to combat AIDS and other killer diseases worldwide. Announcing the decision, the UN Secretary-General, Mr Kofi Annan, welcomed the pledge but said much more money is needed.
In a gesture that may prove more than merely symbolic, Mr Annan, the heads of the World Health Organisation and the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation as well as government representatives from Algeria, Mali, Nigeria, South Africa, Bangladesh and El Salvador have all been invited to attend the summit. Their presence represents an attempt to address some of the concerns - the fight against AIDS, relief of developing world debt, the growing North-South gap - championed by the Seattle People, while making the summit look less like a rich man's club.
Demonstrations allowing, to day's second day of the summit is also expected to address the problems posed by a dramatic slowdown of the world economy with the US President, Mr Bush, urging his European partners to do more to stimulate their own economies. In return, Japan and the Europeans are likely to express concern about the US failure to ratify the Kyoto agreement as well as the US administration's controversial national missile defence shield proposals.