Category Archives: Protest

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

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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.

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

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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.

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Rightwing protesters clash with police in London – video report

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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'.

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

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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.”

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

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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.'

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Zoom admits cutting off activists’ accounts in obedience to China

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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.

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What black America means to Europe

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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?”

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

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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.

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

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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.

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After 15 stunning days of anti-racist protests … what happens next?

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Can the phenomenal response to the police killing of George Floyd be channeled to secure lasting political change?

The New Yorker writer Jelani Cobb captured best the sense of wonder at what is happening on the streets of America. He posted a tweet from Mitt Romney, the Republican senator from Utah, which showed the former presidential candidate marching alongside demonstrators under the banner Black Lives Matter.

“Ladies and gentleman,” Cobb remarked. “This is what you call uncharted territory.”

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No masks, no water: New York protesters held in ‘abysmal’ conditions, experts say

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More than 2,000 people have been arrested in the city and the police treatment of those detained is emboldening people

Protesters in New York have been unnecessarily arrested and detained for as long as 48 hours in “abysmal” conditions without access to masks, food and water, according to legal experts.

Since the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis just over two weeks ago, tens of thousands of people have taken to the streets of New York City in protest over police brutality.

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Statue of 18th-century slave owner Robert Milligan taken down in London – video

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A statue of 18th-century slave owner Robert Milligan has been removed from its place in London’s docklands. The Canal and River Trust earlier said it was working with local authorities and a local museum to organise its safe removal.

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To be Black is to suffer perpetual wounds. Here’s how you can make a difference

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I grew up facing attack after attack on myself and others. Today each of us has a role in the fight for Black lives

I was nine when I was first called a n---- while walking to my mom’s car after school.

Ten when I watched the savage beating of Rodney King by the Los Angeles police department on television. Eleven when I saw the flames and ashes of a city burning after four police officers were found not guilty.

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Hong Kong riot police descend on protesters marking movement anniversary – video

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Several demonstrators were arrested when thousands defied a police order and took to the streets of Hong Kong to mark a year of the ‘million-person march’ against an extradition bill in June 2019. Dozens of riot police descended on the crowds gathered in the city's business district

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‘Call it out!’: global voices from George Floyd protests – video

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Floyd’s death in Minneapolis has been the trigger for a global wave of activism against prejudice and police brutality that has spread to more than 50 countries, becoming a mirror for racism and inequality in societies around the world. In Australia and Papua people protested for indigenous rights, as people took up the cry against injustices in New Zealand, Ghana, France, Germany and the UK

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Hong Kong protests: dozens arrested marking first anniversary in defiance of police ban

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Fifty-three demonstrators arrested after ignoring ban on gatherings to mark one year of protests

More than 50 people were arrested in Hong Kong on Tuesday night after thousands of protesters took to the streets in defiance of a police order to mark the first anniversary of the anti-government movement.

Police riot units used pepper spray and repeatedly charged at crowds in an attempt to disperse protesters gathered near the business district of Central, occupying roads and blocking traffic until well after midnight.

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‘What does the UN stand for?’: anger follows memo on anti-racism protests

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Secretary general has clarified staff are ‘not banned’ from demonstrations after previous guidance warned support for action on George Floyd killing risked reputational damage

The UN’s secretary general, António Guterres, sought to defuse a row over guidance to staff suggesting they should not participate in protests triggered by the police killing of George Floyd. He clarified that staff were “not banned” from joining anti-racism demonstrations, as long as it was in an “entirely private capacity”.

In a letter to staff that followed public pushback from the UN’s own special rapporteur on freedom of assembly, Guterres insisted that a memo from its ethics board did not mean that staff were required to “remain neutral or impartial in the face of racism”.

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Are they gone for good? The Trump supporters who regret their vote

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President’s latest decisions – deploying military forces against protesters, and the church photo op – are chipping away at his base

Donald Trump once famously boasted he could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue, and not lose supporters. For years that seemed true.

Related: Trump reaches for Nixon playbook after protests that have rocked America

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African American film-maker is pepper-sprayed then engages protest police in conversation

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This is the moment the film-maker Christopher Frierson was pepper-sprayed by police while recording anti-racism protests in Brooklyn, New York. The footage shows toxic fumes hitting the camera lens; simultaneously you hear Frierson's visceral groans of pain as he stumbles and falls to the ground. Within moments he was dragged by protesters to the side of the road. The 37-year-old was unable to see for 10 minutes after the incident 

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‘Shame!’: Minneapolis mayor heckled by protesters – video

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Jacob Frey, the mayor of Minneapolis, was heckled by a crowd of protesters telling him to 'go home' on Saturday  after he ruled out defunding the police department during a demonstration.

A majority of the Minneapolis city council pledged on Sunday to disband the police department, with a veto-proof majority, council members declared their intent to 'dismantle' and 'abolish' the embattled police agency responsible for George Floyd’s death

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