A parade of Indian people from many nations gathered in Seattle on Monday to commemorate the invasion of Fort Lawton 40 years ago, when more than 100 Indian people and their allies stormed the property and took a portion of the land “by right of discovery.” After a month of protests the government decided to donate a portion of the land for a cultural center.
About 30 people gathered outside the Sacred Heart of Jesus Church in Denver, Colorado on Sunday to protest a decision by the archdiocese not to re-enroll a child in a Catholic school in Boulder next year because the child’s parents are lesbians.
Days after staging protests on campus as part of the national March 4 Day of Action, a small group of students at Stony Brook University sat down in the hallway outside of President Stanley’s office for hours and begged passersby for spare change to cover the rising costs of tuition.
Downtown Athens was paralyzed once again on Friday when thousands of Greeks took to the streets to protest against the country’s newly announced package of austerity measures.
In Pakistan, the workers of the National Programme for Improvement of Watercourses (NPIW) continued their protest and sit-in in front of Karachi Press Club on Friday, protesting against the Sindh government over delay in regularizing the services of employees.
Dutch gay rights groups have called for a halt to protests against a Catholic church southwest of Amsterdam after it said it would no longer seek to bar homosexuals from taking communion.
In the Philippines, Gabriela – the country’s foremost alliance of progressive women’s organizations - has declared March 8, International Women’s Day, as a “day off” for Filipinas, to be spent out in the streets, marching, protesting and asserting their rights.
Hundreds of thousands took part in the National Day of Action to Defend Public Education yesterday. It was the largest day of coordinated student protest in years. While much of it was focused on the university and state college campuses of California, where students face a 32 percent tuition hike, there were protests at campuses across the country on issues ranging from minority representation to privatization. According to Amy Goodman:
At the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, police used pepper spray to break up a student protest organized by Students for a Democratic Society. Fifteen students were arrested. At SUNY Purchase in New York protesters took over the Student Services Building. Students at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill staged a sit-in at the chancellor’s office. In Washington state, the Olympia Coalition for a Fair Budget held a mock funeral for public education and healthcare and brought a coffin to the state Capitol building. And here in New York City, students and teachers at the City University of New York rallied outside Governor David Paterson’s office.
Watch the above Democracy Now! segment for more details.
Carrefour SA’s 116 stores in Belgium were closed Saturday because of a strike over planned job cuts, said a company spokesman who put the resulting sales loss at the company-owned outlets at 14 million euros ($19 million).
Syrian Catholic Archbishop Basile Georges Casmoussa of Mosul led over 1,000 Iraqi Catholics in a silent protest on February 28 to demand that the government act to put a stop to violence against Christians there.
Three Chinese death-row inmates who say they were tortured into confessing to crimes they didn’t commit have staged a hunger strike to draw attention to their case.
Thousands of adherents of the National Popular Resistance Front (FNRP) marched in the Honduran capital Tegucigalpa Feb. 25 to protest the slaying of civil resistance leaders under what they still consider to be the “de facto regime” of President Porfirio “Pepe” Lobo despite the change in government last month. The rally concluded in front of the National Congress building, where the march was blocked by a military cordon.
On Thursday, protesting Guatemalan teachers in Melchor de Mencos blocked the Melchor Bridge with their bodies to stop vehicular passage through the border between Guatemala and Belize. According to union president Zetina, who spoke on behalf of the teachers, they are demanding a 16% salary increase from their Government, in addition to proper renovation of school buildings.
Thirty-eight Jamaican women — all of them asylum seekers, some of whom have lived in the UK for as long as 10 years — are on hunger strike in holding facilities in the United Kingdom, in protest of their imminent deportation to Jamaica.
Tens of thousands of protesters calling themselves the Purple People took to the streets of Rome on the weekend in a sign of mounting opposition to the Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi. The group, Il Popolo Viola, wore purple sweaters and scarves, Berlusconi masks or striped prison dress to protest against what they say is the undermining of Italian democracy by Mr Berlusconi in his battle with the country’s legal system.
More than 30,000 people took to the streets of Athens Wednesday after two of Greece’s largest trade unions organized a nationwide strike to protest austerity measures aimed at reducing the country’s public debt. But the largely peaceful rally of disgruntled workers was unfortunately disrupted by a group of violent youths who clashed with police.
Hundreds of rallies took place across the nation on Wednesday—the eve of President Obama’s White House Health Care Summit—and over a million signed a petition sent to Congress urging lawmakers to “finish the job and pass real health care reform.”
Hundreds of students from several Jordan, Utah district schools walked out of their classes Thursday morning to protest announced budget cuts that could slash teacher ranks, increase class sizes and impact extracurricular activities.
Nine days after an off-campus student party mocked Black History Month, UC San Diego went through a day of protests, on Wednesday, drawing attention to the small number of African American students enrolled at the beachside campus.
Classes at a secondary school in Midland, Ontario were disrupted Wednesday morning when nearly 200 students walked out to protest rumoured cuts in programming.
Greece faces a growing fuel shortage as a customs workers’ strike halts the flow of petrol into the country. Customs workers have extended their strike against wage freezes and bonus cuts until this Wednesday, when unions across Greece will hold a general strike that is set to bring the country to a standstill.
Last week, A group of lawyers from the Law and Democracy Platform, an Turkish NGO working to strengthen the rule of law while respecting democratic values, protested against the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors (HSYK) decision to strip prosecutors conducting a probe into jailed Erzincan Chief Prosecutor İlhan Cihaner of their special authorities.
Here is a bit of hopeful news from Palestine. Two and a half years after the Israeli Supreme Court deemed that the section of the separation wall that cuts through the village of Bil’in was illegal, the Israeli military has begun re-routing the wall to comply with the ruling. This move will return 30 percent of Bil’in’s land to the village.
In response to the news, Mohammed Khatib, the coordinator of the West Bank-wide Popular Struggle Coordination Committee and a member of the the Bil’in Popular Committee, said:
There should be no doubt in anyone’s mind that the only reason that this is finally happening now are the five years of persistent struggle and the sacrifices the people of my village have made. While we are happy for the lands that do return, we do not forget the lands and crops that remain isolated behind the Wall. Our struggle will continue until all of our lands are returned and the Occupation is over.
Since the wall was erected in 2005, Bil’in has been a focal point for nonviolent resistance in Palestine and garnered widespread support and positive media attention around the world. Residents from the village, along with other Israeli and international activists, participate in a weekly march to the wall every Friday. According to the Popular Struggle Coordination Committee:
In addition to grassroots demonstrations and nonviolent direct actions, Bil’in has held annual conferences on popular resistance since 2006; providing a forum for villagers, activists and academics to discuss strategies for the unarmed struggle against the Occupation.
A protester has a banner around his head that reads ‘Let the people judge’ during an anti-corruption protest in front of the parliament building in Jakarta last week. Lawmakers are conducting an investigation of the government’s $730 million bailout of Bank Century in 2008, which the demonstrators opposed.
In Albany, New York, a rally was held on Monday over plans to allow for natural gas drilling in the Marcellus Shale in upstate New York. Critics say the drilling process known as hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” could contaminate the water supplies of New York City and other areas of the state.
Police officers in Balochistan (Pakistan) staged a sit-in on Monday to protest the fact that their salaries haven’t been increased.
The Cairo Public Transportation workers are starting a strike in all the Cairo garages, at 6am today, demanding the modernization/replacement of the obsolete buses and spare parts, raising allowances related to work hazards, increasing bonuses, reforming the health services, and calling for the formation of a free union, independent from the corrupt state-backed NDP-run Egyptian General Federation of Trade Unions.
Three anti-coal activists in West Virginia have entered their fifth day of a tree-sit on Monday as part of an effort to shut down a mountaintop removal site run by the mining giant Massey Energy. The three activists are perched atop platforms on trees on Coal River Mountain.
A 150-strong group of Belgian firefighters sprayed foam from 20 trucks over a main road in central Brussels, blocking traffic in an effort to press for speedier promotions. Government buildings, including the Minister President’s office, were targeted.
Police and a specialist evictions team began a major operation to end a six-month occupation of an opencast mine site in Scotland this morning by arresting 10 Climate Camp protesters chained to tree houses and make-shift forts. There are about 40 climate campaigners now occupying tunnels, tree houses, and homemade barricaded huts.
About 2,000 photographers gathered in London over the weekend to protest stop and search methods by British police. The photographers say they’ve been unduly targeted by Section 44 of Britain’s Terrorism Act 2000, which was designed to give police greater powers to fight terrorism.
Hundreds of protesters in southern China donned masks to protest a planned incinerator plant, the latest grassroots initiative to target polluting projects in the region.
Greek farmers have been blocking roads in Greece for more than a week to protest the government’s current agricultural policy, which threatens to put 50 thousand people employed in agriculture and livestock out of work.
After more than half a century of intransigent injustice, the Palestine/Israel “conflict”—or “disaster,” or whatever you want to call it—only seems to get worse. In the last few years, Israel has pummeled both Lebanon and the Gaza Strip with devastating impunity and, especially in the Strip, forcibly prevented its victims from making any kind of meaningful recovery. Meanwhile, pro-Palestinian activism in Israeli civil society is reportedly on the decline. But, in one of a series of events since returning from the partly-thwarted Gaza Freedom March, a group of activists spoke of their experiences on Thursday at Judson Memorial Church in Greenwich Village, telling a packed room of more than 200 people, “We are here to celebrate an achievement.”
The Egyptian government didn’t let most of the over 1,300 protesters from around the world into Gaza for the planned march, but those at Judson said that they witnessed a new stage in the emergence of a global movement, facilitated by the Internet, that may well be poised to end the international support that makes Israel’s policies possible. The linchpin of the movement, the Cairo Declaration of the Gaza Freedom March, was drafted by would-be marchers while they waited in Egypt. It includes commitments to:
Palestinian Self-Determination
Ending the Occupation
Equal Rights for All within historic Palestine
The full Right of Return for Palestinian refugees
The Declaration also calls for comprehensive boycott, divestment, and sanctions against Israel and the interests that enable its occupation. Read the rest of this article »
Activists with Witness Against Torture gathered yesterday afternoon at the U.S. Capitol to protest the voided deadline President Obama set for closing the prison camp at Guantanamo. Some held banners on the Capitol steps reading “Broken Promises, Broken Laws, Broken Lives,” while others performed a “memorial service” for the three detainees whose deaths were covered up by the military. 42 were arrested.
About 100 inmates at the Varick Federal Detention Center in Lower Manhattan refused to go to the mess hall on Tuesday morning and gave guards a flier declaring they were on a hunger strike to protest detention policies and practices.
Thousands of French public sector workers went on strike yesterday and took part in demonstrations across the country to protest plans for job and spending cuts.
In Phoenix, more than 20,000 people marched on Saturday to protest the indiscriminate attacks and race-based raids conducted by Sheriff Joe Arpaio against residents of Maricopa County. (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin)
Worker blockades of the Belgian breweries of Anheuser-Busch InBev, which began after the world’s largest beer maker announced it planned to cut 263 jobs out of its 2,700 Belgian workforce, were set to continue into a second week after the collapse of mediated talks last Thursday.
In India, leaders of all-party Joint Action Committee (JAC) of Telangana Saturday began a hunger strike to demand that the central government immediately initiate the process for formation of the state.
British graffiti artist Banksy popped up with 4 new murals on the Regent’s Canal in London last week, one of which was this protest of global warming denialism.
Hundreds of demonstrators rallied on opposite sides of an Israeli-Gaza border crossing on Thursday to protest at the blockade of the strip imposed by Egypt and Israel. In Gaza, about 100 international activists staged a rally with some 500 Gazans, chanting and carrying signs denouncing the blockade. A small number of anti-Zionist, Orthodox Jews were among them.
Internally displaced people at a campsite in Nakuru, Kenya demonstrated along a highway to protest their poor living conditions following the onset of rains and demanded building materials.
Thousands of people in Hong Kong took to the streets on New Year’s Day to demand full democracy in the semi-autonomous Chinese territory. The Chinese government ruled in 2007 that the territory cannot directly elect its leader until 2017 and its legislature until 2020.
To mark the one year anniversary of the three-week Israeli assault on Gaza and to draw the world’s attention to the ongoing humanitarian crisis there, over 1,300 people from more than 40 countries, along with an estimated 50,000 Palestinians, will participate in a nonviolent rally and 5-km (3-mile) march from Abu Drabo - a Palestinian community that has been almost entirely destroyed - to the Erez border crossing into Israel on December 31.
According to its website, the Gaza Freedom March – which is being organized by the International Coalition to End the Illegal Siege of Gaza – will:
…feature hip hop music (including a song written especially for the march) and commentary on the impact of the siege by farmers, fishermen, merchants and others. Upon reaching Erez crossing, balloons, kites and/or flags will be flown to express solidarity with Palestinians and Israeli peace activists on the other side.
Almost all of the international delegates participating in the march are first meeting in Cairo, and will head from there to the Egyptian border with Gaza.
Last Sunday, however, organizers for the march ran into a problem. After months of negotiating with the Egyptian government, the Foreign Ministry announced that the Rafah border crossing would be closed due to the “sensitive situation” in Gaza.
Some 40 activists with Rising Tide Newcastle shut down the railway line leading to Australia’s biggest coal export facility for six hours yesterday to protest the failure of global climate change talks in Copenhagen. 23 people were arrested after police removed them from the human blockade.
Two Greenpeace activists got past security at a formal state dinner at Christiansborg palace in Denmark where Queen Margrethe II hosted world leaders on Friday. They waved banners saying “Politicians Talk – Leaders Act,” in the reception hall of the palace before being evicted.
Greenpeace declared the US Chamber of Commerce headquarters in Washington, D.C. a “climate crime scene” on Thursday to protest the business federation’s continued dismissal of global warming. Activists scaled the Chamber’s building and draped it in yellow crime scene tape, while simultaneously surrounding it with vehicles designed to look like police units and ambulances marked “Climate Crime Unit”.
Thousands of people took to the streets of southern Yemen on Friday to protest a recent military operation against suspected al Qa’eda militants which claimed the lives of dozens of innocent civilians.
To mark the one year anniversary of the three-week Israeli assault on Gaza and to draw the world’s attention to the ongoing humanitarian crisis there, over 1,300 people from more than 40 countries, along with an estimated 50,000 Palestinians, will participate in a nonviolent rally and 5-km (3-mile) march from Abu Drabo - a Palestinian community that has been almost entirely destroyed - to the Erez border crossing into Israel on December 31.
