Hong Kong riot police fired teargas rounds and used a water cannon on Saturday to break up a rally by thousands of masked protesters after Beijing indicated it might tighten its grip on the territory
Continue reading...Category Archives: Protest
Hong Kong protesters attack Chinese news agency offices
Local media show broken windows, graffiti and lobby fire at official Xinhau agency
Protesters have vandalised the Hong Kong office of China’s official Xinhua news agency for the first time in months of anti-government demonstrations, smashing windows and doors.
Local media showed scenes of a fire in the lobby of Xinhua’s office in Wan Chai district, broken windows and graffiti sprayed on a wall. It was unclear if there were people in the building.
Continue reading...Anti-government demonstrations in Iraq swell as protesters defy teargas – video
Tens of thousands took to the streets of Baghdad on Friday under clouds of teargas to demand the removal of the elected government in the biggest protest movement in Iraq since the fall of Saddam Hussein. The city’s Tahrir Square was a chaotic scene of flag-waving demonstrators battling with security forces, while tuk-tuks ferried off wounded dissenters as riot police fired teargas.
Amnesty International this week accused Iraqi security chiefs of using military grade teargas – up to 10 times more powerful than that typically used for crowd control – to try to quell the unrest
Continue reading...‘Fear factor is broken’: protesters demand removal of Iraqi government
Crowds of dissenters in central Baghdad want Iranian influence banished from Iraqi politics
The biggest protest movement in Iraq since the fall of Saddam Hussein has pressed its demand for the removal of the elected government, staring down an embattled political elite and the widespread influence of Iran.
Friday’s rallies of tens of thousands came a day after supporters of Iraq’s embattled leader, Adil Abdul Mahdi, believed they had won the backing of one of two powerful figures that threatened his premiership, a development that appeared to stabilise his position on Thursday.
Continue reading...Protesters in Chile clash with riot police as unrest grows – video
Chile’s embattled president has been forced to cancel two major international summits after government concessions failed to defuse weeks of violent protests
Continue reading...‘Bosses take note’: why GM’s strike could inspire more collective action
More Americans engaged in work stoppages last year than since 1986 – and the successful GM strike may encourage other union leaders, experts say
The recently ended General Motors strike was part of a surprisingly large recent wave of walkouts, and by many measures, the 49,000 strikers emerged so well from their 40-day showdown with the US auto giant that the results could help inspire more worker militancy and strikes, labor analysts and experts say.
“They did pretty well,” said Kristin Dziczek, vice-president of industry, labor and economics at the Center for Automotive Research, based in Ann Arbor, Michigan. “They got more money. They got a pathway to regular employment for temporary workers. They defended their healthcare” when GM was seeking to sharply increase the premiums the United Automobile Workers (UAW) members paid.
Continue reading...The Guardian view on Lebanon and Chile: too little, too late for protesters | Editorial
Mass unrest has seized both countries. The long-term causes will not be resolved quickly or easily
The events which have brought two countries to the brink were precipitated by apparently small policy shifts that proved emblematic of the ruling elite’s inability to answer or even understand their people’s basic needs while enriching themselves. Chile’s biggest political crisis since the return of democracy almost 30 years ago was triggered by a 3% rise in metro fares, the protests which have engulfed and paralysed Lebanon by a proposed tax on WhatsApp calls. But the underlying causes run far deeper, and have been building for much longer. There is deep anger at political and economic systems that have ignored most of the population.
These countries are, of course, very different. Lebanon has been staggering along for years, due to both political dysfunction and endemic corruption. The central bank governor warns that its economy – long shored up by remittances from overseas – is now days away from collapse. Recently it emerged that, before he became prime minister, Saad Hariri gave $16m to a South African model: a sum encapsulating the gulf between the lives of those at the top and the rest.
Continue reading...Demonstrators killed in Iraqi holy city as protests gain momentum – video
At least 18 people were killed and thousands injured in the holy city and pilgrimage site of Kerbala in Iraq, in one of the deadliest single attacks on protesters since anti-government demonstrations erupted earlier this month. Unidentified masked gunmen fired live rounds and teargas at protesters.
Protests that have gripped the country since 1 October were nflamed in the past week as university and high-school students joined demonstrators in Baghdad
Continue reading...Masked men gun down Iraqi protesters in holy city of Karbala
At least 18 people killed and hundreds injured as anti-government protests continue
Masked gunmen have opened fire on Iraqi protesters in the Shia holy city of Karbala, killing at least 18 people and wounding hundreds, security officials said, in one of the deadliest single attacks on protesters since anti-government demonstrations erupted earlier this month.
The attack, which happened overnight, came as Iraqis took to the streets for a fifth consecutive day, protesting against corruption, lack of services and other grievances.
Continue reading...Chicago is not ‘on fire’: police chief hits back at Trump criticism – video
Chicago police superintendent Eddie Johnson responded to Donald Trump's criticism after he shunned the president's speech to a national convention of police officers that was being held in the city while protests against his visit took place on the streets.
Trump said the police chief 'could learn something' from the event, but in a statement published later, Johnson said the city was leading the way on lowering crime and that he would not get 'caught up in negativity'
Continue reading...Chile: protesters light bonfires and clash with police despite cabinet reshuffle
Fresh upheaval erupts shortly after president Sebastían Piñera announces firing of hardline officials
Fresh street battles and fires have broken out in downtown Santiago just hours after Chile’s embattled president, Sebastían Piñera, fired hardline members of his cabinet in an attempt to defuse the country’s biggest political crisis since the return to democracy in 1990.
Bands of protesters lit bonfires along the central Alameda Avenue and clashed with riot police as clouds of teargas and smoke engulfed the centre of the city.
Continue reading...Lebanon protesters form human chain across entire country
Anti-government grassroots movement says it wants to foster feeling of national unity
Tens of thousands of protesters in Lebanon have attempted to form a human chain running across the entire country to symbolise newfound national unity.
Demonstrators planned to join hands from Tripoli to Tyre, a 170km (105-mile) chain running through the capital, Beirut, as part of an unprecedented cross-sectarian mobilisation.
Continue reading...Anti-government protesters defy bloody crackdown in Iraq
Hundreds refuse to leave Tahrir square in Baghdad despite further deadly clashes with security forces
Hundreds of Iraqi protesters remained in Baghdad’s central Tahrir square on Sunday, defying a bloody crackdown that killed scores and an overnight raid by security forces seeking to disperse them.
Young men had erected barricades on a bridge leading to the capital’s fortified Green Zone between them and security forces who continued to lob tear gas canisters towards them.
Continue reading...Hundreds shot and beaten as Chile takes to the streets
Doctors say they don’t have supplies to treat wounded and accuse authorities of under-reporting injuries
“The soldier was about 40m away. He looked at me and fired,” said Christopher Madrid, pointing to the patch above his right eye. “I swung away and the bullet grazed [my forehead] and came out, left a scar of four or five centimetres.”
Madrid, a 25-year-old student, was shot last Monday by Chilean army troops as he marched in a street protest near the Catholic University in central Santiago.
Continue reading...Spanish police clash with thousands of Catalan protesters in Barcelona
Police charge 10,000-strong crowd as pro-independence demonstration turns violent
Spanish police and militant elements in a thousands-strong crowd of protesters clashed in the streets of Barcelona close to police headquarters late on Saturday, as a pro-independence demonstration by a direct action group turned violent.
After a largely peaceful gathering of an estimated 350,000 pro-independence supporters jammed the centre of the city earlier in the day, a second crowd began to form around Barcelona’s police headquarters about 7.30pm. As the crowd grew to around 10,000, according to police estimates, TV footage showed protesters throwing bottles, balls and rubber bullets at officers.
Continue reading...Chile: riot police fire teargas after a million people protest against government – video
A protest in Chile’s capital, Santiago, turned violent as police fired teargas and deployed water cannon to try to disperse demonstrators who were demanding economic reforms
Continue reading...Protests against Ethiopia’s Nobel peace prize PM turn deadly
Violent clashes leave at least 67 dead as activist compares Abiy Ahmed to a dictator
Violence in Ethiopia that began with protests against the prime minister, Abiy Ahmed, and quickly morphed into ethnic clashes has left 67 people dead in Oromia state, a police official said on Friday.
“The total number dead in Oromia is 67,” said Kefyalew Tefera, the regional police chief, adding that five of the dead were police officers.
Continue reading...Iraq: two killed as nationwide anti-government protests turn violent – video report
Two people died in Baghdad on Friday and more than 350 people were injured as Iraqi security forces used teargas and stun grenades to repel crowds marching towards the capital's heavily fortified Green Zone, protesting against corruption and economic hardship. The authorities have struggled to address protesters' grievances since unrest erupted in Baghdad on 1 October, spreading to southern cities. Demonstrators blame corrupt officials and political elites for failing to improve their lives.
Continue reading...Why people are protesting in Haiti – video report
Weeks of widespread protest have paralysed parts of Haiti. Demonstrators are calling for the country's president, Jovenel Moïse, to resign from office, but despite violence and charges of corruption he has so far refused to stand down
- An explosion of protest, a howl of rage – but not a Latin American spring
- Haiti protesters clash with police hours after journalist shot dead
Protests rage around the world – but what comes next?
Unrest is seemingly everywhere. We look at the some of the reasons for and responses to it in Hong Kong, Lebanon, Chile, Catalonia and Iraq
In Lebanon they are against a tax on WhatsApp and endemic corruption. In Chile, a hike in the metro fare and rampant inequality. In Hong Kong, an extradition bill and creeping authoritarianism. In Algeria, a fifth term for an ageing president and decades of military rule.
The protests raging today and in the past months on the streets of cities around the world have varying triggers. But the fuel is familiar: stagnating middle classes, stifled democracy and the bone-deep conviction that things can be different – even if the alternative is not always clear.
Continue reading...