Demanding an immediate end to the war in Iraq, tens of thousands of people marched in cities around the world or demonstrated outside US military bases, but the demonstrations were far smaller than recent protests.
"Bush, murderer," chanted protesters in Paris Saturday, while protesters in Helsinki, Finland roared, "George Bush, CIA, how many kids did you kill today?"
PHOTO: AP
Organizers said there had not been much time to plan protests, but there was little sign of people responding to calls to pour into the streets or responding spontaneously to the start of war. Despite large turnouts in some cities Saturday, the mostly peaceful marches were dwarfed by anti-war protests Feb. 15, which saw some of the largest demonstrations in history.
PHOTO: AP
In the African nation of Sudan, anti-riot police reportedly shot dead a 19-year-old university student during a protest in the capital, Khartoum, his cousin said. Police were not immediately available for comment.
Jaakko Kartano, a student at a march in Helsinki, Finland, said, "People ask what's the use of this, but our task is to instill faith in people and try and prevent anything like it [the war] happening again."
There was a sense of frustration among marchers in London. The turnout was well down from last month's mass rally, which drew at least 750,000 people, with police estimating turnout Saturday at 200,000.
Many protesters said they did not expect British Prime Minister Tony Blair or US President George W. Bush to listen to them.
"I don't think there is a snowball's chance in hell this march will stop the war but it's going to send out a message to next time, maybe," said Ernie Vandermass, a student who marched in London.
Protests would grow as the war continued, organizers said.
In the US, anti-war activists marched in dozens of cities, marshaling well over 100,000 in Manhattan.
Tens of thousands protested in San Francisco after two days of anti-war rallies in which about 2,200 were arrested.
Supporters of the war marched too, often by the thousands, with American flags and chants of "USA!" An estimated 15,000 pro-military demonstrators crammed shoulder-to-shoulder, prayed, and sang patriotic songs in Auburn, Indiana.
In Europe there were dozens of demonstrations involving tens of thousands of people in Britain, France, Germany, Finland, Italy, Sweden, Norway, Denmark and other countries.
A few radicals scuffled with police on the fringes of some demonstrations and there were scattered arrests.
In the Spanish capital Madrid, police fired rubber bullets to disperse protesters for the second day running. In Barcelona, police said 150,000 protested, while town hall officials estimated up to half a million.
Dozens of protesters hurled rocks and paint at police who used tear gas and dogs to stop them from reaching the US embassy in Oslo, Norway.
About 90,000 people marched in Paris, police said. French protesters singled out the McDonald's fast food chain as a symbol of American influence, with protesters pelting rocks at a restaurant in Strasbourg and others bursting into a McDonald's in Lyon.
Police said 30,000 people marched in Bern, Switzerland, where organizers estimated between 40,000 and 50,000.
In Berlin, about 40,000 protested and one placard declared "Dresden 1945, Baghdad 2003: The same crime" -- a reference to the Allied firebombing of the eastern German city at the end of World War II.
In Asia, the largest demonstrations were in Indonesia, the world's most populous Islamic nation, but only a few thousand people took part, some burning US flags and photos of Bush.
The CIA has a message for Chinese government officials worried about their place in Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) government: Come work with us. The agency released two Mandarin-language videos on social media on Thursday inviting disgruntled officials to contact the CIA. The recruitment videos posted on YouTube and X racked up more than 5 million views combined in their first day. The outreach comes as CIA Director John Ratcliffe has vowed to boost the agency’s use of intelligence from human sources and its focus on China, which has recently targeted US officials with its own espionage operations. The videos are “aimed at
STEADFAST FRIEND: The bills encourage increased Taiwan-US engagement and address China’s distortion of UN Resolution 2758 to isolate Taiwan internationally The Presidential Office yesterday thanked the US House of Representatives for unanimously passing two Taiwan-related bills highlighting its solid support for Taiwan’s democracy and global participation, and for deepening bilateral relations. One of the bills, the Taiwan Assurance Implementation Act, requires the US Department of State to periodically review its guidelines for engagement with Taiwan, and report to the US Congress on the guidelines and plans to lift self-imposed limitations on US-Taiwan engagement. The other bill is the Taiwan International Solidarity Act, which clarifies that UN Resolution 2758 does not address the issue of the representation of Taiwan or its people in
US Indo-Pacific Commander Admiral Samuel Paparo on Friday expressed concern over the rate at which China is diversifying its military exercises, the Financial Times (FT) reported on Saturday. “The rates of change on the depth and breadth of their exercises is the one non-linear effect that I’ve seen in the last year that wakes me up at night or keeps me up at night,” Paparo was quoted by FT as saying while attending the annual Sedona Forum at the McCain Institute in Arizona. Paparo also expressed concern over the speed with which China was expanding its military. While the US
SHIFT: Taiwan’s better-than-expected first-quarter GDP and signs of weakness in the US have driven global capital back to emerging markets, the central bank head said The central bank yesterday blamed market speculation for the steep rise in the local currency, and urged exporters and financial institutions to stay calm and stop panic sell-offs to avoid hurting their own profitability. The nation’s top monetary policymaker said that it would step in, if necessary, to maintain order and stability in the foreign exchange market. The remarks came as the NT dollar yesterday closed up NT$0.919 to NT$30.145 against the US dollar in Taipei trading, after rising as high as NT$29.59 in intraday trading. The local currency has surged 5.85 percent against the greenback over the past two sessions, central
RSS