Brzezinski Fears ‘Global Awakening’ And Seeks ‘Concentrated, Universal Power’
Inside the protests rocking nations around the globe
Protests are roiling cities across the world as fed-up citizens take to the streets to vent their grievances — both peacefully and violently — about economic conditions, government corruption and crippling tax hikes.
Hong Kong has been gripped by more than 20 weeks of violent clashes — while in Barcelona, old wounds have reopened as protesters once again demand Catalonia be recognized as a country separate from Spain.
Lebanon, meanwhile, appears to be on the brink of disastrous civil unrest again.
Here’s a look at some of the flareups.
Chile
Schools in Santiago, Chile, were closed Monday and only one line of the capital city’s mass-transit system was working as protesters skirmished again with police and troops.
Many grocery stores were closed, with long lines at those that were open.
In a televised statement Sunday night, President Sebastián Piñera imposed another curfew and extended the country’s state of emergency in hopes of deterring more protests.
“[The protesters] are at war against all good-willed Chileans who want to live in a democracy, with liberty and peace,” Piñera said.
The street violence broke out Friday after a weeks-long dispute with the government over a 3.5% raise in subway fares to $1.17, following a 2.5% boost in January.
The protest began modestly on Oct. 5, when students began jumping turnstiles in defiance of the fare increase.
But things turned violent last week and five people have been killed in clashes. At least 156 police and 11 civilians have been injured.
Protesters set fire to the headquarters of an energy company and torched a clothing factory and supermarket.
The Chilean government declared an emergency Saturday and deployed tanks to the streets for the first time since 1990, when the country returned to democracy after years under a military dictatorship.
Barcelona
Riots erupted in the Catalonia capital of Barcelona last week after nine separatist leaders were hit with lengthy prison sentences — kicking off a week of unrest.
Spain’s Supreme Court on Oct. 14 sentenced the Catalan leaders to up to 13 years behind bars for their part in a 2017 effort to declare independence for the region. Around half of Catalonia’s 7.5 million residents want to break away from Spain to create a new European country.
Last Monday, thousands of protesters shut down the airport, canceling flights.
Throughout the week, local police say, protesters hurled gasoline bombs and other projectiles at them, while setting fires around the city. Cops hit back with rubber bullets, tear gas, batons and water cannons.
On Friday, about a half-million people attended a peaceful demonstration, but riots broke out later in the day.
The crowds ignited fires, including near the Plaza de Catalunya at the top of the tourist hot spot Las Ramblas.
“The streets will always be ours!” they screamed.
Spanish Acting Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez warned that those who caused disturbances would face justice. The cost of protest-related damages in the city has exceeded $1.7 million, according to CNN.
Catalonia’s leader, Quim Torra, said Monday that the protests won’t cease until the Spanish government listens to separatists’ demands.
Hong Kong
Hong Kong police on Monday fired tear gas at demonstrators, who amassed to mark three months since a gang assault on activists at the Yuen Long mass-transit station.
The clashes came a day after widespread violence, in which tens of thousands of people marched through the Kowloon district and demonstrators flung incendiary bombs at cops, torching stores and the entrances to transit stations.
Hong Kong has been battered by five months of often-violent protests amid fears that mainland China is tightening its grip on the semiautonomous region — the worst political crisis since Britain handed its colony back to China in 1997.
The demonstrations began in opposition to an extradition bill that would have allowed criminal suspects in Hong Kong to be sent to mainland China to stand trial.
Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam said she would withdraw the bill, but the rallies turned into a broader push for more democratic reforms.
Protesters are demanding universal suffrage, an independent probe into alleged police brutality, amnesty for those arrested in the skirmishes and an end to the labeling of the protests as riots.
The clashes have seen police fire rubber bullets and even some live rounds, while activists have hurled bricks and gasoline bombs.
Lebanon
Facing escalating mass protests, the government of Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri on Monday approved a package of economic reforms and a 2020 budget without new taxes, hoping to appease people in the streets.
Protests swelled in the hours after the announcement, however, as many demonstrators scorned the package as “empty promises.”
The country’s perilous economic situation reached fever pitch last week when the government proposed a host of austerity measures — sending hundreds of thousands of people into the streets.
Demonstrators say they’re angry at corruption within the government and have called on Hariri, President Michel Aoun and Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri to step down.
The capital of Beirut has been gripped by five days of protests, with strikes over corruption, austerity measures and a $6 monthly tax on WhatsApp voice calls.
The country’s public debt of about $86 billion is the equivalent of more than 150% of its gross domestic product, according to the BBC, one of the highest debt loads in the world.
Haiti
A deepening political crisis has devastated the impoverished Caribbean nation of Haiti, where protesters have called on President Jovenel Moïse to step down.
Thousands of citizens wreaked havoc in the capital of Port-au-Prince on Sunday amid the nation’s devastating fuel shortage and spiraling inflation. Haitians have called for Moïse’s resignation since August, citing shortages and widespread corruption.
Moïse has previously rejected calls for his resignation, saying he would not leave the country in the “hands of armed gangs and drug traffickers.”
Protester Jean Ronald said, “Jovenel is incapable and incompetent, he must pack his bags because Haiti must live.
“It is not normal to live in such an unequal country,” Ronald added, standing in front of the float of self-proclaimed prophet Mackenson Dorilas, a controversial religious leader. Dorilas was sanctioned by the Haitian ministry of faiths in 2018 after saying he could cure AIDS with a bed bug remedy.
Since coming to power in 2017, Moïse has incurred the wrath of an opposition movement that refuses to recognize his election victory. A journalist who was covering the protests was recently found dead in his car of gunshot wounds.
With wires
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