Protests - Page 33

Angry protesters took to the streets of Hong Kong over the weekend to denounce government plans for coronavirus quarantine facilities, arguing that treatment centers should be kept far away from residential neighborhoods, and would be unnecessary if their government properly restricted travel from China.

A group of Iraqi women joined ongoing anti-government protests in Baghdad’s Tahrir Square on Thursday — a daring exercise given both cultural stigmas against women participating in politics and the proclivity of Iran-backed Shiite militia thugs and Iraqi government security forces for murdering demonstrators.

Defiant protesters continue to fill the streets of Iraq despite attacks from security forces and Iran-backed militias that may have killed 550 demonstrators, according to the Iraqi Commission for Human Rights (ICHR).

Anti-police activists are planning to “fuck shit up” in protests against the New York City Police Department, demanding free public transportation on the city’s subway system. 

Anti-Macron firefighters violently clashed with police in Paris, demanding better pay, staff increases and protection from violent attacks. 

The people of Taiwan have been largely sympathetic to the protest movement in Hong Kong, not least because the Taiwanese see Hong Kong as a cautionary tale about Beijing’s “one country, two systems” assimilation offer.

A new and unoccupied residential building in Hong Kong that was designated as a quarantine facility for people infected by the rapidly spreading Wuhan coronavirus was attacked by vandals with firebombs on Sunday, prompting the authorities to postpone plans to expand the quarantine operation.

Police clashed with protesters in Baghdad on Monday after a few comparatively quiet days, resulting in 14 security troops suffering injuries from thrown rocks and complaints of excessive force leveled against police by the protesters.

Protests in Lebanon turned violent again over the weekend, with over 400 injuries reported. There were several claims of security forces using live ammunition against protesters in addition to water cannons and tear gas.

Dozens of protesters blocked the entrance to the Louvre museum and forced the famous Paris landmark to close Friday while they denounced the French government’s plans to overhaul the pension system.

In addition to some Iranian journalists quitting their jobs in anger because the regime lied about shooting down Ukrainian International Airlines Flight PS752, Iranian celebrities are speaking out against their tyrannical rulers, while the common people persist in acts of defiance such as refusing to tread on American flags and holding banned funeral services for airplane victims.

Lebanese security forces detained at least a hundred demonstrators on Thursday as Lebanon’s long-running but mostly peaceful anti-government protests turned violent for the second night in a row. Dozens of people were reportedly injured in clashes with the police.

At a meeting of Hong Kong’s Legislative Council, commonly referred to as LegCo, Security Minister John Lee tacitly defended plans to deploy electroshock weapons against protesters. According to Lee, bringing more nonlethal weapons to bear at the “appropriate time” can “reduce the risk of injuries.”

Protests against the Iranian regime continued for a fourth day on Tuesday, with student rallies held at four universities in Tehran.

Hong Kong Chief Justice Geoffrey Ma said on Monday that a special “task force” will consider “how best and how expeditiously” to handle the enormous number of criminal trials related to the ongoing protest movement.

A video clip highlighted on Sunday by U.N. Watch, a non-governmental organization based in Switzerland, showed students at Iran’s Tehran University refusing to trample on American and Israeli flags as directed by agents of the Basij, a paramilitary force controlled by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

The Iranian regime is once again blocking Internet access in an effort to control mass protests erupting across the country after the ayatollah’s troops shot down a civilian airliner and attempted to cover up the crime.

On Saturday, left-wing activists assembled in London to protest against President Donald Trump, American “imperialism”, and the killing of Iranian Revolutionary Guard leader Qasem Soleimani.

Model and left-wing activist Emily Ratajkowski endorsed socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) for president in a video posted to Twitter on Thursday, even though he is not, as she described, a “young, sexy candidate.”

Communist China unexpectedly announced a new director of Beijing’s liaison office in Hong Kong on Saturday, replacing two-year veteran Wang Zhimin with Luo Huining, a party apparatchik with no discernible experience in either foreign affairs or Hong Kong.

Several anti-war groups planned more than 70 protests throughout the country Saturday to show their dissent against the Pentagon’s decision to kill Iran’s top general, Qasem Soleimani, and to send 3,500 more troops to the Middle East.

Iranian state media reported “mourners” filling the streets of Tehran after Friday prayers and chanting “Death to America!” in response to the death of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Quds Force (IRGC-QF) commander Qasem Soleimani’s death in a U.S. drone strike in Iraq.

A true Person of the Year award, not one dished out for political propaganda purposes, should acknowledge the tremendous influence of the Hong Kong protesters.

Hundreds of Hong Kongers attended a rally on Monday night to honor those who were killed and injured during seven months of demonstrations.

A report from the Paris-based Kurdistan Human Rights Network (KHRN) on Sunday charged Iranian officials with killing one person who was detained during last month’s protests and torturing several others.

A memorial service was held on Thursday in the northern Iranian town of Karaj for Pouya Bakhtiari, a young demonstrator slain during November’s anti-government protests. Iranian security forces broke up the celebration and arrested some of the participants, including Bakhtiari’s family members, fearful that popular unrest might boil over into more mass demonstrations.

Iraqi President Barham Salih on Thursday threatened to resign rather than appoint Asaad al-Edani, currently the governor of Basra, as prime minister. Salih said Edani, who is supported by Iran’s allies in the Iraqi parliament, would be unacceptable to the huge numbers of Iraqis protesting Tehran’s influence in Baghdad.

Hong Kong’s anti-government protests continued on Christmas, with some reports of confrontations between police and demonstrators but not the general chaos government officials seemed to be expecting. 

International groups that monitor Internet blockades said on Wednesday that mobile Internet access is going down across several provinces in Iran, most likely paving the way for another bloody crackdown on protesters.

India’s Interior Ministry said on Tuesday that security will be increased across the country, with all state security officials expected to remain on duty throughout the Christmas and New Year’s holidays, as protests against the controversial Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) continue to escalate.

Although massive protests against India’s Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) have dominated international media coverage, there have been some demonstrations in favor of the law.

Protests against French President Emmanuel Macron’s attempts to reform state pensions are in their 19th day. 

Notorious anti-Brexit activist, Steve Bray, announced that he will give up his protest outside Parliament, which has lasted over two years.

Indian police made hundreds of arrests on Thursday to enforce a ban on protests imposed after the passage of a controversial law that makes it easier for refugees from neighboring Muslim-majority countries to become citizens if they faced religious persecution at home.

Hong Kong’s Tourism Board announced on Wednesday that the city’s fireworks display on New Year’s Eve, traditionally one of the more eye-popping displays around the globe, will be severely curtailed due to security concerns around ongoing protests.

The French President is ready to make changes to his pension reform plans after hundreds of thousands of protesters took to the streets.