Police make arrests as clashes erupt outside RNC
US police forces have arrested at least 17 people in a protest that erupted outside the Republican National Convention (RNC) in Cleveland, Ohio.
The protesters burned the American flag as the convention continued at Quicken Loans Arena on Wednesday.
Police used pepper spray to disperse the demonstrators chanting slogans against the Republican nominee for the 2016 presidential election, Donald Trump.
Those detained were still screaming while being searched and handcuffed by cops.
According to Cleveland Police, two cops were also injured in the course of the skirmishes.
Cops riding horses and bicycles attacked the crowd after they failed to convince them to disperse while firefighters extinguished and confiscated the flag.
Cleveland Police Chief Calvin Williams said some of the protesters’ pants caught on fire.
"Whatever they tried to do with the flag, as we were trying to extinguish it and they were trying to keep it away, their pants leg caught on fire," said Williams, who was present at the site of the clashes. "The charge was assault on an officer because the officer tried to put it out when he saw it getting burned, and there were also counterdemonstrators who were trying to take it away."
Earlier protests near Quicken Loans Arena were reportedly more peaceful.
"There are people that their only reason for being here is disruption, disorder, chaos, hurting people and damaging property," Williams said. "Those are the only people at this point that are giving us any kind of trouble at all."
On the second day of the convention on Tuesday, the New York billionaire businessman was announced as GOP’s nominee for the 2016 vote.
The real estate tycoon will now have to face his Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton, to win the white House in a national vote in November.
Being branded as divisive, Trump has on several occasions offended Muslims, Hispanics, African Americans, and women, among whom he is said to be quite unpopular.
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