22 Nov 11 | Egypt, Middle East and North Africa
The death toll from three days of unrest in Cairo’s downtown Tahrir Square has risen to 33, with more than 1700 injured. More casualties and fatalities are expected as riot police and security forces continue their crackdown on the tens of thousands of protesters demanding the ousting of Field Marshal Hussein Tantawy who heads the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF).
Following the outbreak of unrest, Prime Minister Essam Sharaf’s government resigned. At the same time, the Youth Revolutionary Coalition called on Egyptians to participate in what they hoped would be a million-strong National Rescue protest on Tuesday, calling for the formation of a new government with complete authority to run the country during the transitional period.
“The people feel their revolution has been stolen by the military. So we are back in Tahrir to ask the military rulers to leave. They are all members of Mubarak’s regime. The autocracy has only been replaced by another military dictatorship.”
-22-year-old activist Sahar Mohamed Zaki, who works for an airline company, explaining why protesters had returned to Tahrir
Most of the deaths in Tahrir were the result of gunshot wounds sustained in clashes with security forces as protesters attempted to storm the nearby Interior Ministry, headquarters of the detested police force. Demonstrators — suffering head injuries after being beaten with batons and choking as a result of excessive tear gas inhalation — were being ferried on makeshift stretchers to an area in the square where volunteer medics offered emergency aid. Wailing sirens could be heard as ambulances transported the more serious cases to nearby hospitals for treatment. Bahaa el Razi, a volunteer medic at the scene, told me that most of the casualties suffered from gas inhalation, while a few had been hit by rubber bullets and bird shots. Protesters claimed live ammunition was also being fired in attempts to disperse them.
In one instance, the body of a dead man was thrown by his attackers onto a rubbish heap . The incident enraged eyewitnesses, who insisted that “nothing has changed” and that their lives counted for nothing to those in a position of authority.
“Tantawy, leave!” The chants of the indignant protesters reverberated across the square. The scene was reminiscent of the January uprising that ousted Mubarak. Demonstrations erupted in Tahrir last Friday, with people demanding the ruling military council immediately hand over power to a civilian government. The protesters also called for an end to military trials for civilians and for parliamentary elections to be held on the scheduled date of 28 November. They also called for those responsible for the recent deaths to be punished for their crimes.
“Protests are the only way to get the SCAF to respond to our demands. The military wants to remain a state within a state‚ and does not want to be accountable for its actions. There is no alternative to confrontation.” So said Kamal Habib, a former Salafist who is currently a member of the Safety and Development party.
A middle-aged man who overheard Habib’s comment shook his head in disagreement. He interrupted, saying: “The economy is already in shambles. People need to get off the streets. They are making it difficult for us to get on with our lives and to earn a livelihood.”
He, did not, however, explain why he was in the square.
The latest unrest was sparked by a proposed controversial charter of supra-constitutional principles that activists feared would shield the military’s budget from public scrutiny and allow the military to choose a constituent assembly.
“No state institution is above the law and that includes the military. What we need is transparency,” said 23-year-old Tarek Ali, who works for a telecommunications company.
Deputy Prime Minister for Political Affairs Aly el Selmi has defended the document, which bears his name. In comments published in state-run al Ahram newspaper on Wednesday, he claimed that several political powers, including the Muslim Brotherhood, had earlier agreed to the document with reservations to just two of its articles (9 and 10). Islamists have meanwhile boycotted discussion of the document, arguing that it strips parliament of authority while giving the SCAF veto power over articles with which it does not agree.
The military rulers insist, however, that they will hand over power to a new government once it is elected and have repeatedly assured the public that legislative elections will take place on time. But activists remains sceptical, expressing concerns that the military wants to maintain its grip on power.
In a televised statement on Monday, the military expressed its regret for the events in Tahrir, vowing to investigate those responsible for the violence. The statement called on the public to exercise restraint and for political parties “to work together to find a solution to the current crisis”. The armed forces also reminded the public that those who threaten public order and stability would be dealt with severely.
Many believe the ousted former president, who faces charges of ordering the killing of peaceful protesters , continues to run the country from his prison cell — a claim that has fuelled already inflamed public sentiment against the armed forces. Much of the anger is also directed at the police, whose repressive tactics have failed to change after the revolution.
The brutal crackdown on the Tahrir protesters has so far failed to quell the demonstrations. Similar protests have also taken place over the last three days in other major cities across the country, including Alexandria and Suez. On the contrary, the Tahrir crowd appeared to be swelling Monday night as more people arrived to join the estimated 50,000-strong crowd.
Journalist and television anchor Shahira Amin resigned her post as deputy head of state-run Nile TV on February. Read why she resigned from the “propaganda machine” here.
21 Nov 11 | Europe and Central Asia, News and features
Leah Borromeo says the 2012 games in London could damage free expression in the United Kingdon
A series of Home Office proposals could ban protests during the London 2012 Olympic games. In reaction to the longevity and scale of recent Occupy London takeovers of public and private space at St Paul’s Cathedral, Finsbury Square and a former UBS bank, ministers are reported to be drafting legislation loosely based on part 3 of the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Act 2011 – paying particular note to restricting tents and “sleeping equipment” for up to 90 days around exclusion zones. Police and “authorised officers” will be allowed to disperse protests quickly. Presumably with “reasonable force”.
Don’t be too shocked or too quick to compare this to Beijing 2008. Then, the Beijing Organising Committee banned all foreign visitors and non-Beijing-resident Chinese from attending, watching or applying for the right to demonstrate in authorised protest zones. Athens had protest zones in 2004. So did the Salt Lake City Winter Games in 2002.
The reasoning behind these restrictions is always to “preserve the festivity” of the Olympic experience. And security. Always security. In London’s case, security means Britain apparently waives its own rights and customs to allow America to oversee its own security operations, laying on 21,000 private security contractors and enforcing the London Olympic Games and Paralympic Games Act 2006.
That allows police and “enforcement officers” the right of entry to private buildings suspected of contravening legislation on Olympic advertising. This includes: “advertising of a non-commercial nature” and “announcements or notices of any kind” paying particular attention to “the distribution or provision of documents or articles, the display or projection of words, images, lights or sounds, and things done with or in relation to material which has or may have purposes or uses other than as an advertisement”. In other words, protest.
Artist Peter Kennard, noted for overtly political art in a public context says: “The Secretary of State has regulations banning ‘advertising in the vicinity of the Olympics’. How big is a vicinity? Words fail me and because I make public art in the ‘vicinity’ of the Olympics it might be safer for me if both words and images continue to fail me until after the Olympics”.
A London swamped with police, security officers and spy drones might just dampen all the fun. Providing you sing along with the hymn sheet laid on by the Games’ sponsors and ignore the £9.3 billion price tag, you’ll be fine. But if you argue that a corporate agenda and exploitation is being sold under the auspices of uniting the world under sport and “generating jobs”, you might be in trouble.
The proposed legislation and the laws already in place only serve to secure the profits made by those with heavy financial stakes in the Olympic Games. These corporations read like an anti-capitalist wet dream: McDonalds, Coca-Cola, Dow, G4S, BP…. They may bring jobs to an area, but totally undermine the community-building that encourages grass roots businesses and the local relationships and interactions that stem from that.
It’s interesting to note that the Home Office sees protest as a threat. They’re not only worried about homegrown “domestic extremists” with a grudge against capitalism but international groups seeking to use the Olympics as a platform to air their grievances about authoritarian regimes around the world. Syria, China and Bahrain spring quickly to mind. So instead of giving an example of a functioning democracy where everyone gets a voice and can practise free speech, Britain hides dissent in an attic like it’s an invalid child.
The idea that ministers are considering bans on protest off the back of a global Occupy movement further legitimises the idea that these restrictions are directed at those who oppose one of the greatest and most murderous regimes of the world…capitalism.
So here we go. I hate the Olympics. Arrest me.
08 Nov 11 | Uncategorized
Several reports yesterday and today suggest that police will have baton rounds “available” to them at the student demonstration planned for 9 November.
This has led to some outrage. The Guardian got this absurd quote from Green Party London Assembly member Jenny Jones:
Any officer that shoots a student with a baton round will have to answer to the whole of London. How did we come to this? An unpopular government pushing ahead with policies that are all pain and no gain, relying on police armed with plastic bullets to deal with young people who complain about it all. The prospect of the police shooting at unarmed demonstrators with any kind of bullet is frankly appalling, un-British and reminiscent of scenes currently being used by murderous dictatorships in the Middle East.
This is a bizarre and wrongheaded comparison. To suggest that the possibility of baton rounds being used on protesters in London is somehow the same as the fact of tank shells being fired at protesters in Homs is insulting to people standing against genuine tyranny, as opposed to an “unpopular government”.
Then there is the idea that plastic bullets are somehow “un-British”, which will be news to the people of Northern Ireland, both the ones who identify as British and those who don’t.
Meanwhile, Chavs author Owen Jones has tweeted that the police are using “threats about rubber bullets” in an attempt to “intimidate protesters”. Jones fails to identify what exactly the “threat” is.
In fact, if one examines the language of the Metropolitan Police statement, what we are dealing with is a contingency rather than a threat. This from the BBC:
In a statement, Scotland Yard said rubber bullets – also known as baton rounds – were “carried by a small number of trained officers”, none of whom would be patrolling the route of the march.
“This tactic requires pre-authority, and would take time to deploy, and is one of a range of tactics we have had available for public order, and not used, in the past.”
The story seems to have first emerged on London radio station LBC yesterday. But it is really not a story at all, or at least not a development. The Metropolitan Police have always had the capacity to use rubber bullets, and chosen not to do so.
If it is the case that an LBC reporter contacted the police to ask them if plastic bullets were part of the police’s arsenal to deal with disturbance, it would have been wrong of the police to deny this was the case. But this is very, very different from saying they would be used, and indeed counterintuitive to Met tactics on protest. Plastic bullets are not very useful for containment, which is the Metropolitan Police’s current method of dealing with protesters. Containment (including “kettling”) involves close quarters engagement with protesters, circumstances in which, again, the use of plastic bullets would be absurd (and absurdly dangerous to all parties).
Perhaps the police should be clearer on their tactics and arsenal, but those who claim to be on the side of the protesters should be careful not to create unnecessary tension.
17 Oct 11 | Index Index, Middle East and North Africa, minipost
Thousands of demonstrators took part in an anti-censorship march in the Tunisian capital on Sunday. As the debate between Islamic conservatives and secularists continues in the country, the liberal demonstrators gathered for the march, dubbed “Aataqni” or “set me free” in Tunisian Arabic. The movement follows opposing protests last week, after the decision by Nessma TV to air the film Persepolis. The demonstrators at the Aataqni protest were alarmed by the reaction of the Islamists to the animated film, claiming if that kind of censorship was accepted, it could lead to censorship of other programs.
