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Daily News Analysis

Protesters across Middle East express solidarity with Libya

Crescent International

Washington DC, Crescent Online
February 25, 2011, 2000 PM DST

After Friday prayers, mass demonstrations were held in Egypt, Yemen, Jordan, Bahrain, Iraq, with protesters voicing solidarity with the struggle in Libya and vowed their determination to continue struggling for their rights.

After Friday prayers, mass demonstrations were held in Egypt, Yemen, Jordan, Bahrain, Iraq, with protesters voicing solidarity with the struggle in Libya and vowed their determination to continue struggling for their rights. Al Jazeera and Press TV coverage of Libya has inspired the Tunisians and Egyptians to continue demonstrating until real political change is achieved in their countries, and impelled the Yemenis, Bahrainis, and Jordanians to press for the kind of success gained by the former.

In Yemen, seventeen people have died in the past nine days of anti-Saleh protests. Saleh’s political future looks increasingly bleak, with the northern Shia Houthis declaring their participation in the demonstrations. Protesters in Egypt took to Tahrir square in the thousands to demand that the military purge the prime minister and other appointees of Mubarak. The army was forced to give assurances about free elections. Several thousand people demonstrated in Amman, Jordan, to demand political reforms. Hamzah Mansur, chief of the Islamic Action Front, the political wing of the Muslim Brotherhood in Jordan, told the crowds "reforms have become a necessity that cannot be delayed." Meanwhile, the protests in Bahrain intensified, with people demanding an end to the Khalifa monarchy.

The intensity of the Middle Eastern protests, coupled with the outrage drawn by Qaddafi’s attacks on his own people, have applied pressure on international leaders to take measures to penalize Qaddafi. President Nicolas Sarkozy of France recently announced that Qaddafi must step down, and the US announced it would be imposing sanctions on Libya. However, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey has criticized the plan to impose sanctions, pointing out that pressure needs to be applied on Qaddafi rather than collectively on the Libyan people, who are already suffering oppression from a brutal crackdown.

The protests in Libya, Bahrain, and Iraq have pressurized the imperial oil infrastructure, causing uncertainties that have resulted in the sky-rocketing prices of crude oil. In Manama, Bahrain, a memorial has been erected to commemorate the people who have been slain in the uprising. In Iraq, thousands of people have congregated to protest the corruption of local officials and the policies of Prime Minister Nuri-al-Maliki. Iraqi security forces have fired on and killed several protesters.

END


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