Date: Wed, 19 Feb 2003 13:48:46 +0200 From: "Tahir Wood" <twood-AT-uwc.ac.za> Subject: Re: AUT: Demo numbers worldwide This is a MIME message. If you are reading this text, you may want to consider changing to a mail reader or gateway that understands how to properly handle MIME multipart messages. Chris For South Africa you only have Jo'burg, but there was a demo in Cape Town too (I don't know about the other cities). It was one of the biggest demos I've been to, rivalling the big demos in this city towards the end of the apartheid era. I'm not especially good at estimating crowd sizes, but I would guess that it was upwards of 50 000. Regards Tahir >>> cwright.21stcentury-AT-rcn.com 02/18/03 07:26AM >>> This is a listing of what I have seen so far internationally. Note I am rounding numbers and this is NOT an attempt at a complete list. I left a lot of places out. Also, some numbers from Indymedia seem radically inflated, while others seem about right. I checked the US numbers specifically and went with the lower-end estimates from Indymedia. Other numbers came from other reports internationally which I checked against Indymedia. Roughly, 600 cities worldwide (and that is prolly leaving out a lot of small demos, like in Athens, GA, which at 300 was the largest demo in downtown Athens in decades!) and over ten million people, easily. Maybe more like tens of millions, given that nearly ten million marched in Europe alone. This does not pretend to say anything about the character of the demonstrations, which varied wildly and widely in character, as did police response (for example, the isolation of thousands of marchers in New York City and the arrest of over 300 people, and the hospitalization of more.) One interesting point: the appeal to the UN is not necessarily a bad thing, on the part of non-activists. Here's why: for the first time, including in the US, there is a sense that is emerging that actions like war are a matter of international concern and that people world wide have a right to say something. It indicates a level of internationalism, in a weak form, but real nonetheless, that I think is new and unique prior to a war. So while I am against any idea that the UN would be a good way to handle this, since it could not be, the orientation of millions of people worldwide (and not just the ones who marched) towards a basic internationalism is a good thing. We need to find a way to speak to this and not merely write off the "the UN would be better" sentiment as liberalism. US: LA - 30,000 (Indymedia claims 75-100,000) Chicago - 6,000 (current Indymedia claims are 7,000, as it apparently grew a lot after it got started. The Chicao PD estimate was 6,000) Philadelphia - 10,000 Minneapolis - 7,500 San Diego - 10,000 Hawaii (across about 3 cities on 3 islands) - 1,500 New York - 500,000 San Francisco - 200,000 Canada: Edmonton - 2,500 (Indymedia claims 10,000) Toronto - 50,000 (the Toronto Star reported up to 80,000!) Vancouver - 30,000 Oslo, Norway - 60,000 Rome, Italy - 2 million London, England - 1 million Lisbon, Portugal - 80,000 Canberra, Australia - 10,000 Melbourne, Australia - 100,000 (though the state media, ABC, is claiming 150,000 and Indymedia is claiming 200,000!) Sydney, Australia - 200-250,000 Tokyo, Japan - 25,000 Buenos Aires, Argentina - 15,000 Xania, Crete - 2,500 (60,000 people in Xania) Alicante, Spain - 70,000 Barcelona, Spain - 500,000 Madrid, Spain - 1 million (2 million according to Indymedia) Las Palmas, Spain - 100,000 Seville, Spain - 250,000 Cadiz, Spain - 100,000 Vienna, Austria - 20,000 Sao Paulo, Brazil - 30,000 Rio de Janeiro, Brazil - 15,000 Johannesburg, South Africa - 10,000 Stockholm, Sweden - 80,000 Gotenberg, Sweden - 30,000 Glasgow, Scotland - 50,000 Mexico City, Mexico - 50,000 Stuttgart, Germany - 50,000 Berlin, Germany - 500,000 Irunea, Spain - 20,000 Barcelona, Spain - 1 million Budapest, Hungary - 20,000 Warsaw, Poland - 3,000 Paris, France - 800,000 Dublin, Ireland - 100,000 Amsterdam, Netherlands - 100,000 Athens, Greece - 200,000 Helsinki, Finalnd - 15,000 Bern, Switzerland - 40,000 Copenhagen - 35,000 Other notes: The Atlanta City Council adopted a resolution, 03-R- 0195, at its Feb 3, 2003 meeting, which opposes war in Iraq and calls on the Administration of the United States to seek more peaceful means to settle international differences. If anyone has corrections, please make them known. Cheers, Chris --- from list aut-op-sy-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---
HTML VERSION:
Display software: ArchTracker © Malgosia Askanas, 2000-2005