Category Archives: Protest

Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya: ‘Belarusians weren’t ready for this level of cruelty’

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Opposition leader speaks to the Guardian a year after anti-Lukashenko protests began, as crackdown continues

A year has passed since Belarusians took to the streets to challenge the authoritarian leader, Alexander Lukashenko, over stolen elections, marking the greatest crisis of his 27 years in power and the most harrowing year in the country’s modern history.

In an interview, the opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya issued a message of defiance tinged with pain as she detailed the toll that the last year has taken on the 35,000 jailed, hundreds tortured, and thousands more forced to flee the country or hide from Lukashenko’s crackdown.

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Belarus regime steps up ‘purge’ of activists and media

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Alexander Lukashenko leading ‘vicious operation to eviscerate critical voices’ and civil society, rights groups warn

Aleysa Ivanova wakes up each morning wondering when the knock on her door will come.

“You understand you can be next. Every day I wake up, I think ‘maybe it’ll be tomorrow, maybe today. Maybe they’ll come for me this evening’,” said Ivanova (not her real name).

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A coup or not? Tunisian activists grapple with president’s powergrab

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While Saied’s shutdown of parliament has outsiders worried, in Tunisia he has 87% support and civil society remains strong

Outside Tunisia, the president’s sacking of the prime minister and shutdown of parliament looked like a coup. Inside, however, activists and journalists are still struggling to define what is happening to their country – and what to do about it.

“The day after the president acted, we had a conversation in the newsroom about whether it was a coup,” said Thameur Mekki, the editor-in-chief of the influential media platform Nawaat. Other news outlets aired programmes debating the “coup” question, and activist groups started worrying. But then, said Mekki, the president, Kais Saied, personally called leading civil society groups and “gave assurances about their freedom to operate”.

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Beirut blast: protests mark one year since deadly port explosion – video report

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Thousands of Lebanese people gathered in Beirut to mark the first anniversary of a catastrophic explosion at the port, holding pictures of the dead and demanding justice.

No senior official has been held to account for the disaster, caused by a huge quantity of ammonium nitrate stored unsafely at the port for years. infuriating many Lebanese as their country also endures financial collapse.

As a memorial service got under way at the port, water cannon and teargas were fired at protesters who had been throwing stones towards security forces near parliament

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Missouri governor pardons couple who pointed guns at racial justice activists

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Mark and Patricia McCloskey gained notoriety after standing outside their home with weapons as protesters passed

The governor of Missouri has made good on his promise to pardon Mark and Patricia McCloskey, the couple who gained notoriety for pointing guns at a group of demonstrators who marched past the couple’s home in a luxury St Louis neighborhood during racial justice protests last year.

Mike Parson, a Republican, announced on Tuesday that he had pardoned Mark McCloskey, who pleaded guilty in June to misdemeanor fourth-degree assault and was fined $750, and Patricia McCloskey, who pleaded guilty to misdemeanor harassment and was fined $2,000.

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Amnesty condemns Colombia police brutality after scores of protesters killed

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‘He died as he lived, resisting’, says mother of young artist killed in Cali, as report claims authorities used systematic ‘pattern of violence’ in city

Nicolás Guerrero, a 26-year-old artist from the Colombian city of Cali, took to the streets on 2 May to protest against the lack of opportunities he saw in his country. He had a family in Spain that he had hoped one day to bring to South America. But later that night, after riot police launched a brutal crackdown, he was found lying on the pavement, seriously wounded. He died hours later in hospital.

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French protests grow against extended health pass scheme

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200,000 take to the streets to oppose proof-of-vaccination for hospitals, trains, and cultural and leisure centres

Thousands of people have protested in Paris and other French cities over a mandatory coronavirus health pass for entry to many public venues, introduced by the government as it battles a fourth wave of infections.

Protesters injured three police officers in Paris, a police spokesperson said. The interior minister, Gérald Darmanin, said on Twitter that 19 demonstrators were arrested, including 10 in Paris.

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Tulsa race massacre: 19 bodies reinterred as protesters demand criminal investigation

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  • Bullet found with one set of remains that showed trauma
  • Anthropologist tells crowd: ‘We are not done’

The bodies of 19 people exhumed from an Oklahoma cemetery during a search for victims of the 1921 Tulsa race massacre were reburied in a closed ceremony on Friday, despite objections from protesters outside the cemetery.

Related: ‘I work with the dead. But this can help the living’: the anthropologist investigating the Tulsa race massacre

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Myanmar junta accused of crimes against humanity six months on from coup

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Human Rights Watch says army’s suppression of protests has included torture and murder, as small protests mark milestone

Human Rights Watch has accused Myanmar’s military junta of crimes against humanity as small groups of protesters marked six months since the armed forces seized power.

Bands of university students rode motorbikes around the country’s second-largest city Mandalay on Saturday waving red and green flags, saying they rejected any possibility of talks with the military to negotiate a return to civilian rule.

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Hong Kong man arrested for allegedly booing Chinese anthem while watching Olympics

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Man allegedly also waved colonial-era flags while watching fencer Edgar Cheung’s medal ceremony at a mall

Hong Kong police have arrested a man on suspicion of insulting the national anthem, after he allegedly booed the Chinese national anthem while watching an Olympic event at a mall.

The 40-year-old man was detained on Friday after allegedly waving colonial-era Hong Kong flags and booing, while urging others to join him in insulting the song, according to a police statement posted on Facebook.

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Sheila Jackson Lee is third Black lawmaker to be arrested during voting rights protests

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Congress members Joyce Beatty and Hank Johnson were previously arrested for participating in separate demonstrations

Sheila Jackson Lee, a Democratic representative of Texas, was arrested in Washington DC on Thursday while protesting lawmakers’ delay in passing legislation to protect voting rights, becoming the third member of the Congressional Black Caucus to be arrested for civil disobedience in recent weeks.

Related: Voting curbs enacted in 18 US states this year despite none finding widespread fraud

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The activists sabotaging railways in solidarity with Indigenous people

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People coming to the aid of the Wet’suwet’en nation to stop a pipeline are using direct action that is prompting terror charges

The night of 28 November, Samantha Brooks, 24, hunched over the railway tracks near Bellingham, Washington, about 32km (20 miles) south of the Canada-US border and installed a “shunt,” according to trial documents obtained by the Guardian.

Related: Dakota access pipeline: court strikes down permits in victory for Standing Rock Sioux

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‘A nightmare scenario’: how an anti-trans Instagram post led to violence in the streets

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Misinformation about Wi Spa, a Korean spa in Los Angeles, quickly spread around the world. Since then, trans women in LA have faced violence and online abuse

On 24 June, a woman claimed on Instagram that a Korean spa in Los Angeles had allowed a “man” to expose himself to women and girls in the women’s section.

The unsubstantiated allegations about Wi Spa in LA’s Koreatown neighborhood quickly spread from social media to rightwing forums to far-right news sites to Fox News, and were distorted by anti-transgender groups across multiple countries.

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Powerbrokers of Arab world will be closely watching Tunisia

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Analysis: while the politics behind the government’s dismissal are local, regional players will want to influence what happens next

In the decade since the Arab spring, the crucible of the uprisings has been where its legacy has been thrashed out.

Tunisia, Egypt and Libya, where it all began from mid-December 2010, have remained central to the narrative of what took place when autocracies crumbled in the face of restive streets. And for the region’s powerbrokers, all three north African states have since been the centre of an even bigger tussle for influence.

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Billionaire tycoon named as Lebanese PM as economic crisis bites

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Protesters wanted someone from outside the elite, but parliament went for Najib Miqati, who has led the country twice before

After a year-long standoff, Lebanon has named a new prime minister who its feuding factions hope can ward off a total economic collapse and save an estimated 2 million people from the brink of poverty.

Protesters had demanded the selection of a figure removed from the political elite, but the Lebanese parliament instead named a billionaire tycoon, Najib Miqati, who had led the country twice before, with little success, and was accused by a state prosecutor in 2019 of embezzlement – a charge he denies and has described as politically motivated.

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The last king of Eswatini? Reporting on protests in Africa’s last absolute monarchy

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Cebelihle Mbuyisa is a freelance journalist who was beaten for covering pro-democracy protests in the kingdom of Eswatini. Formerly known as Swaziland, the country has been rocked in recent weeks by anti-monarchy protests calling for King Mswati III, Africa's last absolute monarch, to have his powers diluted. 

Protests turned violent, with reports suggesting there have been more than 50 deaths and countless casualties so far at the hands of state security forces. The Guardian spoke to Mbuyisa, who described his experience of being beaten by the police after they accused him of reporting illegally, and explained why protesters are calling for more democracy in Eswatini.

In his first comments since the unrest began, the king called the protests 'satanic' and said they had taken the country backwards.

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Tunisia president accused of staging coup after suspending parliament

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Kais Saied invokes emergency article of constitution after violent protests against country’s biggest party

Often touted as the lone success story of the Arab spring revolutions a decade ago, Tunisia is facing a critical challenge to its fledgling democracy after its president suspended parliament and dismissed his prime minister in what critics described as a coup.

Kais Saied, an independent without a party behind him, announced he was invoking an emergency article of Tunisia’s constitution late on Sunday night after a day of violent protests against the country’s biggest party, the moderate Islamist Ennahda movement.

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Angry Brazilians dress as reptiles for their Covid jabs to mock Bolsonaro

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People are wearing costumes as a protest to the government’s handling of an outbreak that has killed more than 545,000

When Klinger Duarte Rodrigues set off for his coronavirus shot last weekend he did so dressed as a South American snake.

“A sucuri,” he said, using the indigenous name for the Amazonian water boa whose skin he borrowed for his first dose of AstraZeneca.

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US sanctions Cuban security chief and special forces over crackdown on protests

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Biden moves to pressure government over alleged human rights abuses amid biggest demonstrations in decades

The US has imposed sanctions on a Cuban security minister and an interior ministry special forces unit for alleged human rights abuses in a crackdown on anti-government protests this month.

The move marked the first concrete steps by Joe Biden’s administration to apply pressure on Cuba’s Communist government as it faces calls from US lawmakers and the Cuban American community to show greater support for the biggest protests to hit the island in decades.

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Outcry after Nigerian TV stations told to curb reporting of security issues

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Regulator’s move comes amid fears that limited press freedoms are being eroded by the government

Nigeria’s broadcasting regulator has told TV stations to limit their reporting of rising insecurity in the country and withhold details of incidents and victims, in a move widely criticised by the country’s media and civil society groups.

In a letter sent to the country’s broadcasters, the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) said TV stations should refrain from “giving details of either the security issues or victims of these security challenges”, and they should “collaborate with the government in dealing with the security challenges” by toning down reporting and commentary.

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