Protests against the 2003 Iraq war: Encyclopedia II - Protests against the 2003 Iraq war - Invasion to the fall of Baghdad

Protests against the 2003 Iraq war - Invasion to the fall of Baghdad

Protests against the 2003 Iraq war - March 20 2003

The day after the invasion of Iraq had begun, protests were held in cities around the world. In some U.S. cities, protesters attempted to shut their respective cities down. In Germany, students staged a massive walkout. In London, a massive demonstration was held in front of the Houses of Parliament.

Protests against the 2003 Iraq war - March 21 2003

Demonstrations were organized for a second day in a row in various US cities including Seattle, Portland, Atlanta, San Francisco, and Los Angeles. In the last two cities, demonstrators closed parts of the city to traffic. Following the demonstrations, San Francisco police claimed to have discovered a cache of Molotov cocktails which they claimed were going to be used by demonstrators.

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Protests against the 2003 Iraq war - March 22 2003 and March 23 2003

Media report about 150,000 protesters in Barcelona, Spain (other sources say 1,000,000); more than 100,000 (other sources: up to 500,000) protesters in London, United Kingdom; some 100,000 protesters in Paris, France; at least 150,000 protesters altogether in many German cities; between 35,000 and 90,000 in Lisbon, Portugal; around 40,000 in Berne, the largest protest in Switzerland for decades; 10,000 to 20,000 in Greece, Denmark and Finland. 250,000 protesters demonstrated in New York, USA according to the German Spiegel online magazine. There were protests in Washington, D.C., Chicago and other cities, too. CNN reported a march of over a thousand protesters in Atlanta, Georgia passed by their headquarters, upset over that network's coverage of the war. Canada likewise experienced numerous anti-war protests over the weekend. Crowds of anti-war demonstrators took to the streets of Montreal and Toronto. Calgary held three days of protests (20 March-22nd), culminating in a march which surrounded the government building and American consulate. In the Italian city of Naples 10,000 anti-war protesters marched through the towards a NATO base in Bagnoli. Protests also took place in Wellington, New Zealand, the Australian cities of Brisbane and Hobart (which were brought to a halt), Jakarta, Indonesia, where protesters converged on the US embassy, across South Korea including the capital Seoul where Buddhist monks played drums to console the sprits of war casualties to the 2,000 protesters, Across India including 15,000 in Calcutta, Bangladesh which saw a general strike (closing down many businesses and mosques), Japan, including protests near US naval and air bases on the southern island of Okinawa.[22] Thousands of protesters, mainly Muslims, demonstrated across the African continent. Hundreds (BBC estimate) of young people marched in Mombassa in Kenya. The Somali capital Mogadishu saw protests by students, Koranic schoolchildren, women and intellectuals.[23] There were reports about massive conflicts between protesters and police in the Gulf state of Bahrain for the second day. On the live broadcast of the 2003 Academy Awards, several presenters and recipients made various comments against the war ranging from Susan Sarandon giving a simple peace sign to Michael Moore publicly denouncing George W. Bush upon receiving his award. Critics accused the media of downplaying the demonstrations, e.g. when the Washington Post wrote about protests in Berlin: "Demonstrators also gathered in a half-dozen other German cities", where half-dozen included Leipzig, Halle, Dresden, Jena, Rostock, Hamburg, Munich, Köln, Düsseldorf, Frankfurt, Mannheim, Ludwigshafen, Nuremberg, Stuttgart, Wiesbaden, Karslruhe, Heidelberg, Würzburg, Bielefeld, Hannover, Dortmund, Essen, Bochum, Gelsenkirchen, Wattenscheid, Oberhausen, Duisburg, Mülheim, Herne, Hattingen, Velbert, Hilden, Datteln, Münster, Osnabrück, Bonn, Aachen, Saarbrücken, Kassel, Bremen, Oldenburg, Kiel, Heide, and other cities.

Protests against the 2003 Iraq war - March 24 2003

Media reports state at least 20,000 school pupils protesting in Hamburg, Germany. After the protest march, conflicts between police and protesters broke out in front of a US building in Hamburg. Protesters who were pushed back by the police began to throw stones, who in turn reacted with water cannons. There have since been serious discussions about police abuses in Hamburg, and political ramifications may follow. In the afternoon, 50,000 people protested peacefully in Leipzig following traditional prayers for peace in the city's Nikolai Church. Prayers for peace and subsequent large demonstrations at that church every Monday ('Montagsdemos') helped bring down the GDR government in East Germany in 1989. The weekly demonstrations, supported by churches, trade unions and other civic organizations, began again in January 2003 in protest to the impending invasion of Iraq. Protest marches in the afternoon were also reported in the German cities of Berlin and Freiburg. In Rome, Milan, Turin and other Italian cities, thousands of pupils and schoolteachers stayed away from school to protest against the Iraq war. The teachers union reported that 60 percent of all schools were closed. The strike had been planned weeks ago as a signal against a school reform bill, but was converted to an anti-war protest. 400 anti-war protesters tried to enter the Australian parliament in Canberra to speak to the prime minister, but were stopped by police. In the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh, Maoist protesters attacked shops selling Coca-Cola and US soft drinks. Protests in front of US buildings and in fast food shops were also held in Indonesia. In Egypt, 12,000 students of two universities in Cairo protested as well as 3,000 people in the Thai capital Bangkok. In Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, 150 people threw stones at the United States consulate. The stones were supposed to break the windows, but consulate windows are bullet-proof. The protesters attacked a McDonald's and threw stones and fired upon a Brazilian bank agency controlled by the Brazilian government and stoned a Spanish bank. Five were arrested.

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Protests against the 2003 Iraq war - March 25 2003

Some 100,000 people demonstrated in Syria against the USA, United Kingdom and Israel. This protest was endorsed by the Syrian government. In the Islamic country of Bangladesh, 60,000 people demonstrated. Media also reports protests in front of the South Korean parliament building, linked to plans to bring South Korean forces into the war. In reaction to the protests, these plans were halted.

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Protests against the 2003 Iraq war - March 27 2003

Hundreds of protesters participated in a civil disobedience in New York, USA. In a "die-in" organized by the M27 Coalition (an ad-hoc group comprised of various anti-war organizations and individuals), 215 people were arrested after blocking traffic on 5th Avenue near Rockefeller Centre, protesting the cooperation between U.S. media and the government. Protesters also blocked traffic at various sites around the city in a coordinated protest with the theme of "No Business As Usual." Protests also took place across the U.K. About 250 students (Police estimate) marched on the US embassy in central London. 200 people (South Wales Police estimate) brought Cardiff city centre traffic to a standstill leading to at least six arrests. There was a lunchtime anti-war demonstration on the Humber bridge in Hull which involved some friction between motorists and protesters. In Londonderry, up to a dozen anti-war protesters stormed the Raytheon defense technologies company building staging a sit-in until removed by police. Thousands joined a protest in Manchester.[24]

Protests against the 2003 Iraq war - March 28 2003

Global protests did not stop in the second week of war. Some 10,000 protested in Teheran, Iran. Protesters on the march, supported by the government, chanted "Death to Saddam" as well as "Death to America"[25]. 50,000 to 80,000 people protested in Cairo, Egypt after the Friday prayers. In Bogotá, Colombia there were violent conflicts in front of the US consulate. Protest marches and demonstrations happened also in Algiers, Algeria and in Bahrain, the Palestinian territories, South Korea, Indonesia and Pakistan. In Australia the police prevented protest marches. In Germany, protests by schoolchildren continued. In New Delhi and elsewhere in India, over 20,000 protested against the war. The largest demonstration comprised mainly Muslims, there was also a separate demonstration mainly made up of communists. [26]

Protests against the 2003 Iraq war - March 29 2003

In Boston, Massachusetts 50,000 people attended the largest rally in the city since the end of the Vietnam War. Thousands of people blocked Boylston Street in a die-in along the Boston Common. A handful of arrests were made. In the U.K. hundreds of protesters marched from Cowley into the centre of Oxford [27] and thousands took to the streets of Edinburgh (Police estimated 5,000, Organizers estimated more than 10,000). Edinburgh protesters marched along Princes Street to a mass rally in the city's Meadows area.[28]

Protests against the 2003 Iraq war - March 30 2003

100,000 people marched through the Indonesian capital, Jakarta. According to the BBC's Jonathan Head this was the biggest anti-war demonstration to take place so far in the world's most populous Muslim nation. The first officially sanctioned demonstration took place in China. 200 foreigners were allowed to chant anti-war slogans as they marched past the US embassy in Beijing but around 100 Chinese students had their banners confiscated and were blocked from entering a park where locals had gained permission to demonstrate. In Latin America there were rallies in Santiago, Mexico City, Montevideo, Buenos Aires and Caracas. In Germany at least 40,000 people formed a human chain between the northern cities of Munster and Osnabrueck 35 miles apart. Also about 23,000 took part in marches in Berlin, ending in a rally in Tiergarten park, protests took place in Stuttgart and Frankfurt, where 25 people were arrested as they tried to block the entrance to a US air base. Marches were also held in Paris, Moscow, Budapest, Warsaw and Dublin. [29]

Protests against the 2003 Iraq war - April 7 2003

In Oakland, California, police fired rubber bullets and beanbags at protesters and dockworkers outside the port, injuring at least a dozen demonstrators and six longshoremen standing nearby. Most of the 500 demonstrators were dispersed peacefully, but a crowd of demonstrators was blocking traffic on private property near the port and fail to disperse after police warnings. Oakland Police Chief said demonstrators also threw objects and bolts at them, and said the use of weapons was necessary to disperse the crowd. He indicated that the rubber bullets were used to respond to direct illegal action and the he longshoremen were caught in the crossfire. A dockworker spokesman reported that police gave two minutes to disperse, then opened fire rather than making arrests. Demonstrators also claim that the police took direct aim at them, rather than firing in the air or at the ground. Thirty-one people were arrested. Demonstrators regrouped and marched to the Oakland Federal Building. In New York, USA, protesters targeted the Carlyle Group, an investment firm with deep connections to the war. About 20 protesters were arrested in a planned civil disobedience, but police then also surrounded and arrested close to 100 people who were simply watching the protest from across the street.

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Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Invasion to the fall of Baghdad", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki