Category: Protest and Unrest

U.S. officials have unveiled the latest round of sanctions on Iran over its government’s violence toward women and girls amid the anti-regime protests happening around the country. In a news release, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the Treasury Department has implemented sanctions on multiple Iranian officials, company presidents, security leaders and companies for their role in the crackdown on protests in the country. Many of those protests have been against laws requiring women in Iran to wear head coverings….

A Norfolk Southern train derailed in Clark County on Saturday, prompting Clark County officials to ask residents to shelter in place out of “an abundance of caution.” “The Clark County Emergency Management Agency is asking residents within 1,000 feet of a train derailment at Ohio 41 near the Prime Ohio Business Park to shelter-in-place out of an abundance of caution,” a post by the county reads on Facebook. “We ask that all residents in need of travel to Ohio 41…

Tens of thousands rally for the ninth straight week against government plan to overhaul court system.

Dozens of schoolgirls admitted to hospital across several Iranian provinces, according to local media reports.

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New York City police detain a legal observer during a peaceful protest in Mott Haven on June 4, 2020.
© 2020 C.S. Muncy

In an agreement made public yesterday, New York City will pay up to $4-6 million to partially settle a legal case brought by hundreds of people trapped, beaten, and wrongfully arrested by the New York Police Department (NYPD) in the summer of 2020.

A Human Rights Watch report and video produced with Situ Research documents the incident that is the subject of the lawsuit, which took place on June 4, 2020 in the Mott Haven neighborhood of the South Bronx. The report and video reveal how the NYPD – with no provocation or warning – surrounded, assaulted, and arrested hundreds of protesters in the majority Black and brown neighborhood that has long experienced police brutality and systemic racism.

This settlement, while important, is only partial, as many other related claims are ongoing. It is also no substitute for real accountability.

These are just some of the abuses that organizations like Bronx Defenders, Brooklyn Defender Services, the Center for Constitutional Rights, Communities United for Police Reform, the Legal Aid Society, the New York Civil Liberties Union, and others have documented for decades.

Just yesterday, the NYPD failed to show up for a city council hearing about the litany of substantiated complaints filed against the Strategic Response Group (SRG), an NYPD unit responsible for many of the abuses Human Rights Watch documented. The NYPD cited ongoing litigation, no excuse for not showing up at an oversight hearing.

The settlement is one of many that the city has made over the years for police abuses, costing taxpayers $121 million in the past five years alone. In 2014 the city paid $18 million to settle police misconduct cases connected to protests during the 2004 Republican National Convention; the actual price tag was even higher because the city spent roughly the same amount defending the cases.

The NYPD has also failed to adequately discipline or charge many of those responsible for this and other incidents connected to NYPD actions during the 2020 protests, according to a Civilian Complaint Review Board report, yet New York Mayor Eric Adams continues to want to boost the NYPD’s $5 billion budget.

Here’s the bottom line: Police misconduct during the Mott Haven protest reveals deep, systemic problems requiring comprehensive reforms. This includes re-imagining community safety, a vision that should include dramatically decreasing the NYPD’s size, the scope of issues police respond to – including peaceful protests – and its funding. Instead, historically underserved communities like Mott Haven need investments that will improve access to education, housing, and health care.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency ordered Norfolk Southern on Tuesday to pay for the cleanup of the East Palestine, Ohio train wreck and chemical release as federal regulators took charge of long-term recovery efforts and promised worried residents they wouldn’t be forgotten.

The crackdown on opponents of President Saied has sparked international criticism and fears of a return to autocracy.

The Philippine government said Friday it intended to appeal an International Criminal Court decision to reopen an inquiry into Manila’s brutal anti-drug campaign, which left thousands dead. The Hague-based tribunal launched the inquiry in 2019 but suspended it later that year at the request of the government of then Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte, who had launched the crackdown in 2016, with Manila saying it would re-examine cases of alleged abuses. Announcing the probe’s resumption on Thursday, the ICC said its…

Turkey’s foreign minister on Thursday accused Sweden of being complicit in a “hate and racist crime” for failing to prevent weekend protests in Stockholm by an anti-Islam and pro-Kurdish groups. Mevlut Cavusoglu also confirmed that a key meeting in Brussels to discuss Sweden and Finland’s NATO membership has been postponed, saying such a meeting would have been “meaningless” in the wake of the protests. Turkey has been infuriated by a Quran-burning protest by anti-Islam activist Rasmus Paludan on Saturday and…

Defence Minister Anita Anand says she has “no news to share” on whether Canada is willing to send some of its battle tanks to Ukraine — should Germany greenlight the export — following a meeting of 50 allied defence leaders this week. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has repeatedly issued pleas for tanks, although members of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group failed to come to an agreement on what to send after meetings at the Ramstein Air Base in Germany this…

Peru closed its famed tourist site Machu Picchu Saturday as authorities expelled protesters from a Lima university where they have been sheltering as they wage relentless anti-government demonstrations in the capital. Protests demanding the resignation of Peruvian President Dina Boluarte have been ongoing since early December, leaving 46 people dead and prompting the government to impose a state of emergency in violence-hit areas. Authorities announced Saturday yet another protester had died following demonstrations in the country’s south, with the victim…

Vietnamese President Nguyen Xuan Phuc resigned Tuesday, becoming the most senior member of the government to step down after a series of high-profile corruption scandals for which he was held responsible. The state Vietnam News Agency reported that he had resigned at a session of the ruling Communist Party’s Central Committee that was held “to consider and give opinions on Comrade Nguyen Xuan Phuc’s wish to stop holding positions, quit work and retire.” The language of the announcement strongly suggested…

Brazil’s Supreme Court has agreed to investigate whether former president Jair Bolsonaro incited the far-right mob that ransacked the country’s Congress, top court and presidential offices, a swift escalation in the probe that shows the ex-leader could face legal consequences for an extremist movement he helped build. Justice Alexandre de Moraes granted a request from the prosecutor general’s office to include Bolsonaro in the wider investigation, citing a video the former president posted on Facebook two days after the riot….