A bevy of protest groups with a range of agendas are likely to stage demonstrations within view of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation leaders' summit later this month, though San Francisco city leaders would probably prefer they did not.

Whether or not any of the groups organizing ahead of the APEC summit will attract a critical mass of protesters remains to be seen. But protest energy, particularly around the Israel-Hamas conflict and Israel's bombing of Gaza, is pretty high, as evidenced by a march with at least 10,000 people taking part last weekend on Market Street — a march that briefly blockaded an SF freeway.

As the Chronicle reports, Palestinian liberation advocates are just one of the groups planning to protest the event, which is expected to bring around 20,000 people, including world leaders, from across the Pacific sphere to the city. There will also be Filipino Indigenous rights activists protesting the presence of Filipino president Bongbong Marcos, as well as climate change activists, workers' rights activists, and likely others.

The city, meanwhile, is hoping to put on its best face and avoid any international-level embarrassment — and city leaders are certainly hoping that a successful event will help bolster future tourism from Asia and dispel the city's current prevailing image as a cesspool of drugs and homelessness.

"APEC is a moment to bring [together] nations, policies, economic interests and points of view from a wide range of perspectives," said Mayor London Breed's office in a statement to the Chronicle.

And Breed said in an earlier interview with the paper, "Our hope is to make sure that, from the press to the participants, to everyone that will be here, that they will look at San Francisco and say to themselves, ‘Oh, my goodness, this is a beautiful city.'"

We also learned Tuesday that President Joe Biden has confirmed plans to meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping during the summit. It will be the two presidents' first face-to-face meeting since a conversation they had at the Group of 20 summit in Bali one year ago.

While the Chronicle doesn't mention them, Falun Gong protesters, who are a regular sight at SF's Chinese consulate, are more than likely to protest President Xi's presence, and others may turn out to protest Chinese human rights abuses generally.

The local Filipino community may turn out en masse to protest the visit by President Marcos. San Francisco-born activist Brandon Lee, whose name you may recall from an extra-judicial assassination attempt on his life in 2019 in which he was shot four times outside his home in the Philippines, tells the Chronicle that it's "abhorrent" that the city and the U.S. government should be rolling out the red carpet for Marcos, who is the son of notorious dictator Ferdinand Marcos.

As Lee characterizes it, "We’re paying for snipers to be pointed at us."

The U.S. Secret Service plans to establish a security perimeter around the event at the Moscone Center, which will cause buses to be re-routed and will likely cause traffic headaches generally around downtown.

A spokesperson for the Secret Service, Nathan Herring, tells the Chronicle that protesters will be permitted in designated areas — and plans are being prepared for how to handle larger demonstrations should they occur.

The APEC summit runs from November 14 to November 19.

Previously: APEC Summit Will Close Freeway Ramps, All Streets Around Moscone Center, and Central Subway for Six Days

Photo: Graham Klinger