Category Archives: Protest

‘Tipping point’: Greta Thunberg hails Black Lives Matter protests

Posted on by

People are realising ‘we cannot keep looking away from these things’, says climate activist

Greta Thunberg has said the Black Lives Matter protests show society has reached a tipping point where injustice can no longer be ignored, but that she believes a “green recovery plan” from the coronavirus pandemic will not be enough to solve the climate crisis.

Reflecting on the protests that have swept the globe in recent weeks, the Swedish climate activist told the BBC: “It feels like we have passed some kind of social tipping point where people are starting to realise that we cannot keep looking away from these things. We cannot keep sweeping these things under the carpet, these injustices.

Continue reading...

Juneteenth: rallies and celebrations across America commemorate end of slavery – live

Posted on by

In Oakland, thousands rallied with members of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU), whose workers arranged a strike at 29 ports up and down the West Coast.

I was there, earlier today. The union workers were joined by a motorcycle brigade, a car caravan, a fleet of cyclists, and thousands on foot. Activist and scholar Angela Davis and filmmaker Boots Riley addressed the crowd.

pic.twitter.com/ggfrz1bV9Q

In Wisconsin, governor Tony Evers called on the state legislature to ban police chokeholds, among reforms that he unveiled today.

The Democratic governor did not ask for a special legislative session to take up the policy as soon as possible, as the Brack Legislative Caucus had requested.

Our country promises the opportunity of justice and equity and in the wake of the murders of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor and the calls for justice across our state and nation, and as we celebrate Juneteenth today, we are called to deliver on that promise.

Continue reading...

Is this the end for colonial-era statues? – video

Posted on by

Statues of colonialists and brutal leaders have been toppled by protesters or removed by governments in recent weeks as campaigns to bring down monuments to historical figures tainted by racism and slavery spread around the world.

In Belgium, during Black Lives Matter protests, numerous statues of King Leopold II, whose brutal rule of Congo caused an estimated 10 million deaths through murder, starvation and disease, were defaced and covered in red paint. While in the UK, Oxford University’s Oriel College voted in favour of removing its statue of the Victorian imperialist Cecil Rhodes.

In response to the latest action, the historian David Olusoga looks at the significance of these statues and examines the impact they have had on the victims of colonialists and imperialists, as well as the cost borne by their descendants

Continue reading...

Trump administration sues former adviser John Bolton to block his book – live

Posted on by

The lawsuit filed by the US against John Bolton aims to stop the former administration official “ from compromising national security by publishing a book containing classified information.”

But it states that “on or around” 27 April, Ellen Knight, who was reviewing Bolton’s manuscript, “had completed her review and was of the judgment that the manuscript draft did not contain classified information”.

Bolton’s book The Room Where It Happened will be a critical account of the Trump administration, according to the publisher.

Bolton “shows a president addicted to chaos, who embraced our enemies and spurned our friends, and was deeply suspicious of his own government”, according to Simon and Schuster.

Continue reading...

Police fire teargas at largely peaceful healthcare protest in Paris – video

Posted on by

French nursing unions called for a national strike to ask for better working conditions and to demand the government keep its promise to overhaul France’s hospital system in response to the coronavirus crisis. 

Police fired teargas after being pelted with objects by a small minority that overturned a car during the demonstration led by healthcare workers

Continue reading...

France vows to end violence in Dijon after fourth night of unrest

Posted on by

Police say alleged assault on Chechen boy may have sparked reprisals in Grésilles area

The French government has vowed to bring an end to violence in the usually placid eastern city of Dijon after it was hit by a fourth night of unrest allegedly linked to score-settling by members of the Chechen community.

According to police, the incidents appear to have been sparked by an alleged assault this month on a 16-year-old Chechen boy, prompting reprisal raids.

Continue reading...

Gunshots heard after demonstrators try to topple conquistador statue in New Mexico – video

Posted on by

A man was shot after a scuffle broke out when demonstrators tried to remove a bronze sculpture of a Spanish conquistador outside a museum in Albuquerque, New Mexico. A group of armed men had tried to protect the statue of Juan de Oñate. The injured man was in a critical but stable condition, police said.

Authorities later announced the monument would be removed until the next step could be determined

Continue reading...

Beyoncé demands justice for Breonna Taylor in letter to Kentucky attorney general – live

Posted on by

Donald Trump’s star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame has been defaced yet again during Sunday afternoon’s Black Lives Matter protest in Los Angeles, although these days it might qualify as bigger news if the former reality TV host’s terrazzo-and-brass totem went longer than a week unmolested.

Trump’s star was defaced during today’s Hollywood protest march. #blm #hollywoodprotest #JusticeForGeorgeFlyod #hollywoodboulevard #hollywoodblvd #protests pic.twitter.com/UI3SOIZSiV

Hundreds of demonstrators have gathered at the Montana State Capitol building in Helena in protest of the killing of George Floyd and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement.

The Helena Independent Record reports Sunday’s protest is the largest of a number of demonstrations that have been held in Montana’s capital city in recent weeks amid the nationwide backlash to police-related violence against black and brown people.

The protest for George Floyd in Helena, MT is... huge. pic.twitter.com/LLwdiHMwxZ

Continue reading...

Police seek protests ban after 23 officers injured in London rallies

Posted on by

Head of police union for England and Wales calls for emergency law during Covid-19 pandemic

Priti Patel has been urged to impose an emergency ban on all protests after Britain’s biggest police force condemned the “mindless hooliganism” and “utterly shocking” violence of far-right activists against its officers in London.

The head of the body representing rank-and-file police officers in England and Wales called for tougher restrictions on demonstrations after 23 officers were injured and more than 100 people were arrested during clashes in London on Saturday.

Continue reading...

Rayshard Brooks: protesters set fire to Wendy’s after black man shot dead by police – video report

Posted on by

Demonstrators set fire to a fast food restaurant in Atlanta on Saturday where Rayshard Brooks, 27, was shot dead by a police officer the previous night. Police were called to the restaurant over reports that he had fallen asleep in the drive-through line.

The Georgia Bureau of Investigation, which is investigating the shooting, said Brooks failed a field sobriety test and then resisted officers' attempts to arrest him.

Continue reading...

Why Trump loves the US military – but it doesn’t love him back

Posted on by

The president’s West Point speech went smoothly but protests have focused a harsh light on his use of the military

Donald Trump attempted to solidify his bond with the US army on Saturday, delivering the graduation speech to cadets at the United States Military Academy and boasting of a “colossal” $2tn rebuilding of American martial might.

Related: Top US military general Mark Milley apologizes for Trump church photo-op

Continue reading...

How the killing of George Floyd exposed Hong Kong activists’ uneasy relationship with Donald Trump

Posted on by

The US president may be the pro-democracy movement’s biggest backer, but some protesters feel they are being used

Hong Kong’s pro-democracy movement has struggled to reconcile the support it has received from Donald Trump with his administration’s brutal crackdown on protests over the police killing of George Floyd.

In the past few weeks, unprecedented Black Lives Matter protests, renewed by the killing of George Floyd by a white police officer, have spread to every US state and to countries across the world, regardless of pandemic restrictions.

Continue reading...

ABC News executive placed on leave after allegations of racist remarks – live

Posted on by

The Fulton county district attorney’s office has opened an investigation into an incident in which Atlanta police shot and killed a man on Friday night. Police responded to reports that a man had fallen asleep in his car at a Wendy’s drive-thru and was blocking traffic. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI) says the man was shot and killed after police tried to take him into custody. One report says the man tried to grab a police taser. The GBI is conducting its own investigation. Unverified reports on social media say the man who died was black.

JUST IN: The #FultonCounty DA’s statement about the @Atlanta_Police involved shooting Friday night. pic.twitter.com/Z3mwwvOnNz

Athletes at the University of Texas have asked the school song to be changed along with the names of buildings on campus.

“The recent events across the country regarding racial injustice have brought to light the systemic racism that has always been prevalent in our country as well as the racism that has historically plagued our campus,” the athletes said in a statement.

Continue reading...

Rightwing protesters clash with police in London – video report

Posted on by

Rightwing demonstrators, who announced they would turn out on Saturday to protect London's monuments from anti-racism protesters, were involved in scuffles with police outside Parliament.

In and around Parliament Square, hundreds of people wearing football shirts, chanting 'England, England' and describing themselves as patriots, gathered alongside military veterans at the Cenotaph war memorial.

The group sang songs in support of rightwing activist Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, who goes by the name of Tommy Robinson. 'Winston Churchill, he's one of our own,' they also chanted, near his statue which last weekend was sprayed with graffiti reading: 'Churchill was a racist'.

Continue reading...

Trump says ‘concept of chokeholds sounds innocent’ as states move to ban practice – live

Posted on by

That’s it from me today. My west coast colleague, Lois Beckett, will be taking over the blog for the next few hours.

Here’s where the day stands so far:

The Trump administration has finalized a rule rolling back Obama-era protections for transgender Americans under the Affordable Care Act’s non-discrimination policy.

According to the new version of the policy, the department of health and human services will be “returning to the government’s interpretation of sex discrimination according to the plain meaning of the word ‘sex’ as male or female and as determined by biology.”

Continue reading...

‘Illegal’: mayor says Trump cannot disband Seattle’s ‘autonomous zone’ – video

Posted on by

Seattle's mayor has defended the Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone, or 'Chaz', a space over several blocks transformed into a community without police which Donald Trump has threatened to disband.

In a tweet, Donald Trump described the protesters as 'domestic terrorists', In another tweet addressing the Seattle mayor, Jenny Durkan, and the Washington governor, Jay Inslee, he told them to 'take back your city NOW… If you don’t do it, I will.'

Continue reading...

Zoom admits cutting off activists’ accounts in obedience to China

Posted on by

Meetings on Tiananmen Square massacre and Hong Kong crisis were taken down because Communist government complained

Zoom has admitted it suspended the accounts of human rights activists at the behest of the Chinese government and suggested it will block any further meetings that Beijing complains are illegal.

On Thursday the video conferencing platform was accused of disrupting or shutting down the accounts of three activists who held online events relating to the Tiananmen Square massacre anniversary or discussing the crisis in Hong Kong. None were given an explanation by Zoom.

Continue reading...

What black America means to Europe

Posted on by

Many have attempted to claim that ‘things are better here’ for black people than in the US. This ignores both Europe’s colonial past and its own racist present. By Gary Younge

In September 1963, in Llansteffan, Wales, a stained-glass artist named John Petts was listening to the radio when he heard the news that four black girls had been murdered in a bombing while at Sunday school at the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama.

The news moved Petts, who was white and British, deeply. “Naturally, as a father, I was horrified by the death of the children,” said Petts, in a recording archived by London’s Imperial War Museum. “As a craftsman in a meticulous craft, I was horrified by the smashing of all those [stained-glass] windows. And I thought to myself, my word, what can we do about this?”

Continue reading...

Trump would ‘not even consider’ renaming bases with Confederate links

Posted on by

President contradicts defense secretary who said he was open to discussing new names for military bases named after Confederates

Donald Trump said on Wednesday he would “not even consider” renaming US military bases that are named after Confederate military leaders, even though the Pentagon has indicated it is open to the idea.

The statement from the US president came amid widespread anti-racism protests that have convulsed the country and were triggered by the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis last month.

Continue reading...

‘Ten years of watching people die online has left me so angry’: young protesters on why they are marching

Posted on by

The UK’s Black Lives Matter protests have been spearheaded by a new generation of activists. Six demonstrators from a recent London march reveal what brought them to the streets

The killing of George Floyd by a white police officer took place thousands of miles from the UK. But the 46-year-old’s cry in Minnesota that he could not breathe has sparked widespread protest in Britain. In the past two weeks, there have been demonstrations across UK cities. The protesters, the vast majority of whom were under 25, chanted: “No justice, no peace, no racist police” and “the UK is not innocent”. The demonstrations were largely organised through word of mouth and social media rather than established anti-racism groups.

Protesters carried handmade placards with the names of Mark Duggan, Sean Rigg, Julian Cole and others killed or left disabled by British police. They chanted for the Windrush generation, the victims of the Grenfell tower fire, and decried the high Covid-19 death rate among members of the BAME community.

Continue reading...