I WATCHED the video of the young woman being hit with a baton at the London G20 protests. I distinctly heard the policeman yell at her to go away.

Now, this may not have been the polite message she spoke about in her interview, but it was clearly an instruction to go away.

It was obvious the policeman was stressed by the situation. No doubt he was being barracked by the crowd, but she did nothing to relieve the situation.

Rather, she kept approaching him and although I could not hear what she said, I am sure it would not be conciliatory. I think she achieved the response she set out to provoke, possibly not quite as she imagined, but enough to enable her to claim the police were too brutal.

This is what these protestors want, to destroy our faith in the police and allow anarchy to rule.

Police are human beings, too, and when stressed may occasionally fail to meet our exacting standards, but we must not judge them too harshly under the circumstances.

If blame is to be laid anywhere it should be with the people who gave the order to use the tactics employed and the small number of protestors who were there to create trouble.

Tom Cooper, Durham City.