ZURICH. Several hundred people gathered on Langstrasse late on Saturday, and the night ended with burning containers, a burnt-out car and police water cannon in Kreis 4. City police said the situation had calmed by about 1.30am on Sunday. The cost of the damage has not been put in francs, and the investigation is open.
The account from the city police is specific about the clock. Around 10.30pm a crowd formed at Piazza Cella, on Langstrasse, and mixed with people already out for Halloween. Some were masked. Some wore protective goggles. Some were dressed for the holiday. Police said calls for a gathering in Kreis 4 had circulated on social media, and on specialist sites, after events in France in recent days and weeks. Fireworks went off repeatedly.
Around 11pm the group moved along Langstrasse toward Helvetiaplatz. At Langstrasse and Stauffacherstrasse, containers were pulled into the road and set alight. City police sent in water cannon and pushed the crowd back. It then split. Separate groups moved through the district. More containers were burned, and so were electric bikes and electric scooters. On Zwinglistrasse a car was set on fire. Windows at the VBZ stop at Stauffacher, and at shops near Helvetiaplatz, were damaged.
A patrol pulled off a medical call
Officers were attacked again and again with fireworks, bottles and stones, police said. They answered with water cannon, irritant and rubber ammunition. The professional fire brigade, Schutz und Rettung Zürich, was called to the fires. Onlookers got in the way of the operation, the police statement said. Cantonal police reinforced the city force.
Shortly after midnight a patrol car sent to a medical emergency on Brauerstrasse was attacked. The car was damaged and the officers had to pull back before they could help a teenager who had suffered serious leg injuries in an accident. Police did not say, in the statement issued overnight, how many people had been arrested. They did say the disorder had eased by about 1.30am.
What is known on Sunday morning
A second city had a smaller version of the same night. In Basel, an unauthorised demonstration also ended with barricades and waste containers set on fire. Reports linked both gatherings to youth protests that had already filled streets in France and in Germany. Zurich’s statement did not name an organiser.
What residents can rely on this morning is the police chronology, not a political verdict. Several hundred people. A start around 10.30pm at Piazza Cella. Fires in the road. A car burned on Zwinglistrasse. Force used by police, and force used against police. A teenager injured badly enough that a patrol was diverted, then itself attacked. A bill for the damage that the city says it cannot yet name.
The night also lands in a month when voters are already being asked about fireworks. On 29 November Switzerland votes on a proposal to restrict noisy fireworks, and the first poll put support near 69 per cent. Saturday was not that campaign. It was a street that the police spent about three hours taking back, and a Sunday on which Kreis 4 is counting broken glass.