0
LONDON, Jan 18: Protesters took to the streets from Cairo to Tokyo on Saturday in mass anti-war demonstrations fired up by speculation a strike on Iraq was drawing near.
Tens of thousands of demonstrators gathered in cities across the Americas, Asia, Europe, and the Middle East as US troops amassed in the Gulf.
In the Middle East, protests sounded an ominous note. Thousands of demonstrators in Beirut carrying Palestinian and Iraqi flags chanted: “Sign your name on a suicide attack on US interests, so we can fight an American attack along with Iraq.”
Maverick British politician George Galloway said at the march: “A peaceful solution must be found, or we’re all going over the cliff in the Middle East and all of us will be damaged in the fall.”
Tens of thousands of Syrians blocked traffic on the streets of Damascus as they marched against what they saw as a pre-set US plan to attack a fellow Arab state.
In central Cairo, about 1,000 demonstrators called on the Egyptian government to prevent US and British warships from using the Suez Canal en route to attacking Iraq.
More than 4,000 Japanese gathered in central Tokyo, police said, some wearing traditional costumes, others masks representing US President George W. Bush.
“I cannot forgive (America’s) aggressive attitude,” Koki Okazaki, a 16-year-old demonstrator, said. “It would be an awful thing if Japan were to take part in the war.”
One poster depicted Bush as a kimono-clad Japanese warlord, with Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and British Prime Minister Tony Blair, a key ally, as his retainers.
Organizers say the deployment of US troops to the Gulf, and widespread speculation that a Jan 27 report by U.N. arms inspectors could serve as a trigger for war, had lit a fire under the American peace movement.
In traditionally neutral Ireland more than 2,000 people protested against a government decision allowing US military aircraft to use southwest Shannon Airport en route to the Gulf.
“There’s been too much capital invested in this war for it not to happen. But we’re making our position clear, we’re saying ‘no’,” protester Adam Conway said.
“This war is a war for oil,” said Marie-George Buffet, national secretary of the Communist Party, as she marched at the head of a Paris protest. “The way to fight (Iraqi President) Saddam Hussein is to let the United Nations inspectors do their job.”
In all, 48 French cities and towns held marches. An estimated 200,000 people participated in the demonstrations. Protests were also held in Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Russia.
About 4,000 peaceful protesters turned out in Gothenburg, Sweden, police said. A slogan read: “Drop Bush not bombs.”
In Britain, several thousand protesters gathered at protests in London, the Welsh capital Cardiff, and the northern English cities of Liverpool and Bradford.
“We want to say to the government: ‘Don’t attack Iraq. It is completely unjust, based on lies, rhetoric and spin,” said Neil Kingsnorth, representing the anti-war group CND in Bradford.
An anti-war vigil was planned for London later on Saturday, to be led by veteran left-wing politician Tony Benn. “You cannot take a nation to war unless it is united. There is massive opposition in Britain — 58 percent,” Benn said in advance.
At a protest at Northwood military headquarters in London, two people dressed up as a pantomime horse — with a mask of Bush on the head, and Blair’s face at the rear.
RADICALISM: A war in Iraq could ignite radicalism in Indonesia, moderate religious leaders and scholars told the visiting top US envoy for Asia, James Kelly, during talks here on Saturday.
“Is war truly the best step? We’re hesitant, because the impact of it could provoke radicalism here,” said Komaruddin Hidayat, a professor from the state Islamic university.
He was briefing reporters on a meeting held by several Indonesian intellectuals with Kelly at the home of the US ambassador here.
Hidayat said they told Kelly, the Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia and Pacific Affairs, that extremism would be invited in Indonesia if the United States was unable to prove its case that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction.
“With the result that if later there is an impact, it will be big. So we ask, OK, oppose terrorism but please be very careful, don’t create unrest in Indonesia and other countries,” Hidayat said.
The talks with Kelly revealed that an American attack on Iraq was still not certain, Hidayat said.
Kelly is on the second and final day of his visit to Jakarta. He is due to leave for Japan Saturday night on the next leg of his regional tour, which is also addressing terrorism and the North Korea nuclear crisis.
During talks on Friday with government officials including President Megawati Sukarnoputri, Kelly expressed hope the Iraqi problem could be resolved peacefully but did not close the door to war as a last resort, Foreign Minister Hassan Wirayuda said.
Megawati said war over Iraq could greatly increase feelings of dissatisfaction with the United States, Wirayuda said.—Reuter/AFP
