Tag: urban space

Africa
OGFTZ

Worker uprising at Chinese FTZ in Nigeria

Aggrieved workers at a Chinese company in the Ogun-Guangdong Free Trade Zone, in Nigeria’s Ogun State, staged an uprising after they were locked within the complex, ostensibly under emergency measures to contain COVID-19. Several vehicles and a sentry box were set ablaze. The incident comes amid tensions between Nigeria and China over reports of Nigerian nationals in Guangzhou facing discrimination and harassment, apparently because of unfounded rumors that they are carrying the coronavirus. (Photo via Instagram)

Watching the Shadows
antitrump banner

Global COVID-19 police state consolidates

It’s an irony that with police-state measures mounting worldwide to enforce lockdowns and contain COVID-19, Trump is now claiming sweeping executive power to lift lockdowns in the US in spite of the pandemic. Asserting his prerogative to override state governors and order economies open again, Trump stated: “When someone is president of the United States, the authority is total.” The media response has been to call this out as blatantly unconstitutional. While it is necessary to point out the illegitimacy of Trump’s pretended power-grab, it is also side-stepping the real threat here: of the pandemic being exploited to declare an actual “state of exception” in which constitutional restraints are suspended altogether—perhaps permanently. (Photo of protest outside “morgue truck” in New York City: Donna Aceto/Rise and Resist)

South Asia
CAA

Trump complicit in Delhi pogrom

At least 27 are dead in days of communal violence in Delhi that coincided with Donald Trump’s first visit to India as president. The violence began as protests against India’s new citizenship law sparked a reaction by Hindu militants, who began attacking Muslims and torching Muslim-owned shops. Delhi judicial authorities have opened an investigation, and ordered police officials to view video clips of incitement by local leaders of the ruling Hindu-nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The violence, centered in the district of Maujpur, was raging as Trump was meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, praising him at a press conference afterwards as “working very hard on religious freedom.” (Image: Sowmya Reddy)

Southern Cone
Chile protest

Chile to vote on new constitution next year

Chile’s President Sebastian Piñera signed a law allowing a referendum on a new constitution for the country. The law was passed by the Chilean congress following more than two months of mass protests. The referendum is scheduled for April 26, and asks voters two questions: should Chile have a new constitution; and who should write it, an assembly of elected citizens or an assembly that would include a mix of current lawmakers? Revocation of the Pinochet-era constitution has been a key demand of the protest movement, which began with an uprising against transit fare hikes in Santiago. (Photo: Carlos Figueroa/Wikimedia via Jurist)

The Andes
sutesal

Peru next for regional protest wave?

Weeks after a nationwide uprising in Chile was sparked by protests over transit fare hikes in the capital, politicians in neighboring Peru are issuing nervous warnings in the wake of days of street demonstrations in Lima. This week, students occupied Central Station on Lima’s Metro to demand subsidized transit fares, workers marched to oppose the privatization of the city’s water system, and hundreds protested the pending release of imprisoned right-wing political leader Keiko Fujimori. President Martin Vizcarra took note of the threat of widespread unrest when he told the Annual Conference of Executives that Peru “is not free of protests” and must work to fight corruption and close the wealth gap. But his prescription was for an “authentic” free market—precisely the policies now being protested. (Photo: Diario Uno)

The Andes
Bogota protest

Duque starts dialogue after Colombia strike

Colombia’s President Ivan Duque has convened his National Labor Concord Commission to begin the “National Conversation” he pledged this week in a bid to quell a fast-mounting anti-government protest wave. Social leaders, mayors and departmental governors from across the country are to participate in the talks. The protests escalated when trade unions, including the giant Unitary Workers Central (CUT), called a nationwide general strike, and repressive measures by the National Police only fueled the mass mobilization. (Photo: Hollman Morris via Colombia Reports)

Africa
Oromo protest

Protests, ethnic violence rock Ethiopia’s Oromia

Nearly 70 people have been killed in Ethiopia’s central Oromia region following a week of unrest and ethnic violence. The eruption began after Jawar Mohammed, prominent advocate for the Oromo people, posted on social media about an imminent attempt on his life by security forces. Supporters surrounded his house and police retreated, but violence quickly spread. The army has now been deployed to put down the protests. Illegal sales of traditional Oromo lands to facilitate urban expansion on the outskirts of Addis Ababa has long been a grievance of the Oromo people. But anger has been unleashed on ethnic minorities in Oromia. In Sebeta, a town within the Oromia Special Zone surrounding the capital, eight members of Gamos people were killed, apparently by a mob of Oromo youth. Followers of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church as well as Muslims have also been targeted, with both churches and mosques attacked. (Photo of gathering outside Jawar Mohammed’s home via Twitter)

Southern Cone
Santiago protest

Econo-protests from Santiago to Beirut

A state of emergency has been declared in Chile following protests that initially erupted over transit fare hikes in Santiago but quickly escalated to an uprising over general economic agony. Youth have blocked thoroughfares, burned buses and ransacked shops, while whole families have filled the streets in a nationwide cacerolazo—beating pots and pans to express outrage over the high cost of living. Protesters have similarly taken the streets, erected barricades and clashed with police in Lebanon, where a state of “economic emergency” has been declared. Again, demonstrations were initially sparked by government plans to impose a tax on text messaging, but protests have continued even after the tax was rescinded in response to the upsurge of popular anger. Demonstrators have revived the slogan from the 2011 Arab Revolution, “The people demand the fall of the regime.” (Photo: KaosEnLaRed)

The Andes
Quito protest

Ecuador: celebration as protesters score victory

Celebrations broke out across Ecuador after President Lenin Moreno agreed to overturn Decree 883, which would have eliminated fuel subsidies. Moreno’s capitulation followed 10 days of nationwide protests that left at least eight dead, hundreds injured and more than 1,000 detained. Moreno and protest leaders are to open a dialogue to find other means to cut Ecuador’s public spending. (Photo: CONAIE via Twitter)

East Asia

Street clashes as Hong Kong protesters defy ban

Hong Kong riot police used tear-gas, rubber bullets and water cannon to disperse protesters as tens of thousands marched in the city, defying a ban. Police fired live rounds over the heads of the crowd as “warning shots” in Causeway Bay. Some protesters set fires and threw Molotov cocktails and bricks at police lines. TV news footage showed riot police beating people with their batons inside commuter-train cars. In a first for Hong Kong, police water-cannon trucks fired dyed water at protesters near government headquarters in an effort to identify those who fled for later arrest. The Civil Human Rights Front, a coalition of around 50 pro-democracy groups, had cancelled the march in response to the ban, but many organizations pledged to carry on anyway—with some calling the march a “religious” procession in a bid to evade the government ban. (Photo: HKFP)

New York City

NYC: outrage over automotive terror —at last

Hundreds of bicyclists staged a “die-in” in New York’s Washington Square Park, expressing outrage over the spate of killings of cyclists on the city’s streets. Three deaths came in a one-week period, finally prompting demands for public action: Robyn Hightman, a 20-year-old bicycle messenger and track racer, was killed by a truck driver in Manhattan. Ernest Askew, 57, riding an e-bike in Brooklyn, was hit and killed by a teen driver. And Devra Freelander, 28, an artist, was killed by a cement truck driver, also in Brooklyn. Hightman was the 12th cyclist killed on New York City streets in 2019; 10 were killed in all of 2018. (Photo: Streetsblog)

Greater Middle East

Dozens detained at Istanbul May Day march

Turkish police detained at least 100 people who attempted to stage a May Day demonstration in Istanbul’s iconic Taksim Square, where protests are traditionally banned. Several thousand more gathered in the city’s Bakirkoy district, for a permitted march organized by the Confederation of Progressive Trade Unions (DÄ°SK). In the permitted march was a large Kurdish contingent, led by women wearing white scarves to demand the release of political prisoners. The women were mostly mothers and relatives of followers of the People’s Democratic Party (HDP) and People’s Democratic Congress (HDK) who have been imprisoned over the course of the current crackdown on political dissent in Turkey. (Photo: ANF)