There have been considerable protests against the Iraq War in the build up to and following the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Between 2002 and 2005, protests were held in many cities worldwide, often coordinated to occur simultaneously around the world. After the biggest series of demonstrations, on February 15, 2003, New York Times writer Patrick Tyler claimed that they showed that there were two superpowers on the planet, the United States and worldwide public opinion.
These demonstrations against the war were mainly organized by anti-war organisations, many of whom had been formed in opposition to the invasion of Afghanistan. In some Arab countries demonstrations were organized by the State. Europe saw the biggest mobilization of protesters, including a rally of 3 million people in Rome, Italy which is listed in the Guinness Book of Records as the largest ever anti-war rally.
*
According to the French academic Dominique Reynié between the 3rd of January and 12th of April 2003, 36 million people across the globe took part in almost 3,000 protests against the Iraq war.*
Prior to the invasion of Iraq
These protests are said to be the biggest global peace protests before a war actually started; the
peace movement is compared with the movement caused by the
Vietnam War.
Protests were held worldwide in opposition to a war with Iraq, including in
Turkey,
Egypt,
Pakistan,
Japan,
Belgium,
the Netherlands,
Argentina, and the
United States, where Americans attended a rally in
Washington, DC. The
U.S. Park Police, which oversees activities on
The Mall, stopped providing estimates of crowd size after being threatened with lawsuits by the organizers of the
Million Man March, but said that protest organizers only had a permit for 30,000 demonstrators. According to rally organizers, more than 200,000 Americans were in attendance.
Protests took place in various cities across the world. Over 100,000 people took part in a protest in
Washington. 50,000 people took part in a demonstration in
San Francisco.
*
Around 150 protests took place in the UK across the country, including Critical Mass bike rides, occupations, and mass demonstrations in Brighton, Manchester, Glasgow and London. Protests also took place in the US.*
Demonstrations against the war at the end of the first
European Social Forum in
Florence,
Italy. According to the organizers, 1,000,000 people were in attendance. Local authorities put attendance at 500,000.
Anti-war demonstrations, focusing particularly but not exclusively on the expected war with Iraq, took place in villages, towns, and cities around the world, including
Tokyo,
Moscow,
Paris,
London,
Dublin,
Montréal,
Ottawa,
Toronto,
Cologne,
Bonn,
Gothenburg,
Florence,
Oslo,
Rotterdam,
Istanbul and
Cairo,
NION and ANSWER jointly organized protests in Washington D.C. and San Francisco, California. Other protests took place all over the United States, including various smaller places such as Lincoln, Nebraska.
In San Francisco, between 150,000 and 200,000 people attended the demonstration. The San Francisco police had originally estimated the crowd size at 55,000, but admitted later that they had badly underestimated the number and changed their estimate to 150,000. The day started with a waterfront rally at 11 am, followed by a march down Market Street to the Civic Center.
In Washington, thousands of people (CNN estimate) demonstrated through the city, ending with a rally at The Mall. Among the speakers was Rev. Jesse Jackson who told the crowd that "We are here because we choose coexistence over coannihilation."
*
The protests were planned to coincide with the birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr. *
Millions of people protested, in approximately 800 cities around the world. Listed by the 2004 Guinness Book of Records as the largest protest in human history, protests occurred among others in the United Kingdom, Italy, Spain, Germany, Switzerland, Ireland, the United States, Canada, Australia, South Africa, Syria, India, Russia, South Korea, Japan, and even McMurdo Station in Antarctica. The largest demonstration this day occurred in London, where 2,000,000 protesters gathered in Hyde Park; speakers included the Reverend Jesse Jackson, London mayor Ken Livingstone, and Liberal Democrats leader Charles Kennedy.
Three separate marches converged on
Manchester Town Hall,
UK. Official estimates put the number of participants at 10,000 (although this was disputed by organisers), making it the biggest political demonstration in the city since the
Peterloo Massacre in 1819
*.
Spanish and Italian cities showed some of the largest turnouts against their governments' pro-war stance, with more than 400,000 protesters in
Milan, more than 300,000 in Barcelona forming a mile-long human chain
and more than 120,000 in Madrid Aranjuez,
Palencia, and in the
Canary Islands [http://es.news.yahoo.com/030315/44/2lwms.html" target="_blank" >
*. In London over 1.5 million people protested against the war and the UK's involvement. The Iraq War is largely credited as the turning point in Tony Blair's governments popularity.
Many of the protests were smaller than those in the same cities a month ago; an exception was that in Montreal, which upped its turnout to 200,000 people. The turnout may have been related to solidarity against American anti-French sentiment, which was a common theme for many of the protesters.A further 15,000 protested in Quebec City. Marseilles. *" target="_blank" >100,000 protested in Berlin, some 20,000 protested in Athens, close to 10,000 people marched in Tokyo, and tens of thousands in Washington DC. Organizers claimed between 30,000 and 45,000 people turned out, while The Oregonian and the Associated Press estimated between 20,000 and 25,000 people attended, closer to the number in Portland who participated in the 18 January protest. Bangkok, Seoul, Hong Kong, Amman, Calcutta, Melbourne, Christchurch, Dunedin, Paris, London, Portsmouth, Leeds, York, Exeter, Newcastle upon Tyne, Frankfurt, Nuremberg, Zurich, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Nicosia, Monaco, Santiago de Chile, Havana, Buenos Aires, Moscow, Seattle, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Atlanta, Vancouver, Halifax, Ottawa, and Toronto, as well as cities in Yemen, Turkey, Israel, and the Palestinian territories.****" target="_blank" >[http://es.news.yahoo.com/030315/44/2lwzu.html (Some articles include: Worldwide figures (La Presse (Quebec), in French), Worldwide figures(New York Times - requires free registration), CBC News (Canada) - report on Australian marches.)
More than 6,000 candlelight vigils for peace were held in more than a hundred countries
*.
Across the
United Kingdom tens of thousands of school students staged walkouts.
In Birmingham 4,000 (BBC estimate) striking school students held a demonstration which ended at Victoria Square. Though there were some reports of some students throwing coins, West Midlands police said that the protests were "buoyant rather than boisterous" and no arrests were made. The demonstration later moved on to Cannon Hill Park. The son of Lord Hunt a junior health Minister who quit his job over the march was amongst the students in attendance *.
In West Yorkshire around 500 students (BBC estimate) walked out of Ilkley Grammar School, reportedly one-third of the student body. In Bradford up to 200 students (BBC estimate) gathered in Centenary Square.
Demonstrations also took place in the city centre in Leeds and Horsforth. *.
A large protest took place at Westminster where London school students gathered.
Invasion to the fall of Baghdad
The day after the invasion of Iraq had begun, protests were held in cities around the world. In some U.S. cities, protesters attempted to shut their respective cities down. In Germany, students staged a massive walkout. In London, a massive demonstration was held in front of the Houses of Parliament.
Demonstrations were organized for a second day in a row in various US cities including
Seattle,
Portland,
Atlanta,
San Francisco, and
Los Angeles. In the last two cities, demonstrators closed parts of the city to traffic. Following the demonstrations, San Francisco police claimed to have discovered a cache of
Molotov cocktails which they claimed were going to be used by demonstrators.
Media report about 150,000 protesters in Barcelona, Spain (other sources say 1,000,000); more than 100,000 (other sources: up to 500,000) protesters in London, United Kingdom; some 100,000 protesters in Paris, France; at least 150,000 protesters altogether in many German cities; between 35,000 and 90,000 in Lisbon, Portugal; around 40,000 in Berne, the largest protest in Switzerland for decades; 10,000 to 20,000 in Greece, Denmark and Finland. 250,000 protesters demonstrated in New York, USA according to the German Spiegel online magazine. There were protests in Washington, D.C., Chicago and other cities, too. CNN reported a march of over a thousand protesters in Atlanta, Georgia passed by their headquarters, upset over that network's coverage of the war. Canada likewise experienced numerous anti-war protests over the weekend. Crowds of anti-war demonstrators took to the streets of Montreal and Toronto. Calgary held three days of protests (20 March-22nd), culminating in a march which surrounded the government building and American consulate. In the Italian city of Naples 10,000 anti-war protesters marched through the towards a NATO base in Bagnoli. Protests also took place in Wellington, New Zealand, the Australian cities of Brisbane and Hobart (which were brought to a halt), Jakarta, Indonesia, where protesters converged on the US embassy, across South Korea including the capital Seoul where Buddhist monks played drums to console the sprits of war casualties to the 2,000 protesters, Across India including 15,000 in Calcutta, Bangladesh which saw a general strike (closing down many businesses and mosques), Japan, including protests near US naval and air bases on the southern island of Okinawa.Thousands of protesters, mainly Muslims, demonstrated across the African continent. Hundreds (BBC estimate) of young people marched in Mombassa in Kenya. The Somali capital Mogadishu saw protests by students, Koranic schoolchildren, women and intellectuals.[http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/2873045.stm There were reports about massive conflicts between protesters and police in the Gulf state of Bahrain for the second day. On the live broadcast of the 2003 Academy Awards, several presenters and recipients made various comments against the war ranging from Susan Sarandon giving a simple peace sign to Michael Moore publicly denouncing George W. Bush upon receiving his award. Critics accused the media of downplaying the demonstrations, e.g. when the Washington Post wrote about protests in Berlin: "Demonstrators also gathered in a half-dozen other German cities", where half-dozen included Leipzig, Halle, Dresden, Jena, Rostock, Hamburg, Munich, Köln, Düsseldorf, Frankfurt, Mannheim, Ludwigshafen, Nuremberg, Stuttgart, Wiesbaden, Karslruhe, Heidelberg, Würzburg, Bielefeld, Hannover, Dortmund, Essen, Bochum, Gelsenkirchen, Wattenscheid, Oberhausen, Duisburg, Mülheim, Herne, Hattingen, Velbert, Hilden, Datteln, Münster, Osnabrück, Bonn, Aachen, Saarbrücken, Kassel, Bremen, Oldenburg, Kiel, Heide, and other cities.
Media reports state at least 20,000 school pupils protesting in
Hamburg,
Germany. After the protest march, conflicts between police and protesters broke out in front of a US building in Hamburg. Protesters who were pushed back by the police began to throw stones, who in turn reacted with
water cannons. There have since been serious discussions about police abuses in Hamburg, and political ramifications may follow. In the afternoon, 50,000 people protested peacefully in
Leipzig following traditional prayers for peace in the city's Nikolai Church. Prayers for peace and subsequent large demonstrations at that church every Monday ('Montagsdemos') helped bring down the
GDR government in East Germany in
1989. The weekly demonstrations, supported by churches, trade unions and other civic organizations, began again in January 2003 in protest to the impending invasion of Iraq. Protest marches in the afternoon were also reported in the German cities of
Berlin and
Freiburg. In
Rome,
Milan,
Turin and other
Italian cities, thousands of pupils and schoolteachers stayed away from school to protest against the Iraq war. The teachers union reported that 60 percent of all schools were closed. The strike had been planned weeks ago as a signal against a school reform bill, but was converted to an anti-war protest. 400 anti-war protesters tried to enter the
Australian parliament in
Canberra to speak to the prime minister, but were stopped by police. In the
Indian state of
Andhra Pradesh,
Maoist protesters attacked shops selling
Coca-Cola and US soft drinks. Protests in front of US buildings and in fast food shops were also held in
Indonesia. In
Egypt, 12,000 students of two universities in
Cairo protested as well as 3,000 people in the
Thai capital
Bangkok. In
Rio de Janeiro,
Brazil, 150 people threw stones at the United States consulate. The stones were supposed to break the windows, but consulate windows are bullet-proof. The protesters attacked a
McDonald's and threw stones and fired upon a Brazilian bank agency controlled by the Brazilian government and stoned a Spanish bank. Five were arrested.
Some 100,000 people demonstrated in
Syria against the
USA,
United Kingdom and
Israel. This protest was endorsed by the Syrian government. In the
Islamic country of
Bangladesh, 60,000 people demonstrated. Media also reports protests in front of the
South Korean parliament building, linked to plans to bring South Korean forces into the war. In reaction to the protests, these plans were halted.
Hundreds of protesters participated in a civil disobedience in
New York,
USA. In a "die-in" organized by the M27 Coalition (an ad-hoc group comprised of various anti-war organizations and individuals), 215 people were arrested after blocking traffic on 5th Avenue near Rockefeller Center, protesting the cooperation between U.S. media and the government. Protesters also blocked traffic at various sites around the city in a coordinated protest with the theme of "No Business As Usual." Protests also took place across the U.K. About 250 students (Police estimate) marched on the US embassy in central London. 200 people (South Wales Police estimate) brought Cardiff city centre traffic to a standstill leading to at least six arrests. There was a lunchtime anti-war demonstration on the Humber bridge in Hull which involved some friction between motorists and protesters. In
Londonderry, up to a dozen anti-war protesters stormed the Raytheon defense technologies company building staging a sit-in until removed by police. Thousands joined a protest in Manchester.
*
Global protests did not stop in the second week of war. Some 10,000 protested in
Teheran,
Iran. Protesters on the march, supported by the government, chanted "Death to Saddam" as well as "Death to America"
50,000 to 80,000 people protested in Cairo,
Egypt after the Friday prayers. In
Bogotá,
Colombia there were violent conflicts in front of the US consulate. Protest marches and demonstrations happened also in
Algiers,
Algeria and in
Bahrain, the
Palestinian territories,
South Korea,
Indonesia and
Pakistan. In
Australia the police prevented protest marches. In
Germany, protests by schoolchildren continued. In
New Delhi and elsewhere in India, over 20,000 protested against the war. The largest demonstration comprised mainly Muslims, there was also a separate demonstration mainly made up of communists. [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/2895171.stm
In
Boston,
Massachusetts 50,000 people attended the largest rally in the city since the end of the
Vietnam War. Thousands of people blocked Boylston Street in a
die-in along the
Boston Common. A handful of arrests were made. In the U.K. hundreds of protesters marched from
Cowley into the centre of
Oxford and thousands took to the streets of Edinburgh (Police estimated 5,000, Organizers estimated more than 10,000). Edinburgh protesters marched along Princes Street to a mass rally in the city's Meadows area.[http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/2897411.stm
100,000 people marched through the
Indonesian capital,
Jakarta. According to the BBC's Jonathan Head this was the biggest anti-war demonstration to take place so far in the world's most populous Muslim nation. The first officially sanctioned demonstration took place in
China. 200 foreigners were allowed to chant anti-war slogans as they marched past the US embassy in
Beijing but around 100 Chinese students had their banners confiscated and were blocked from entering a park where locals had gained permission to demonstrate. In
Latin America there were rallies in Santiago, Mexico City, Montevideo, Buenos Aires and Caracas. In Germany at least 40,000 people formed a human chain between the northern cities of Munster and Osnabrueck 35 miles apart. Also about 23,000 took part in marches in Berlin, ending in a rally in Tiergarten park, protests took place in Stuttgart and Frankfurt, where 25 people were arrested as they tried to block the entrance to a US air base. Marches were also held in Paris, Moscow, Budapest, Warsaw and Dublin.
*
In
Oakland,
California, police fired
rubber bullets and
beanbags at protesters and dockworkers outside the port, injuring at least a dozen demonstrators and six longshoremen standing nearby. Most of the 500 demonstrators were dispersed peacefully, but a crowd of demonstrators was blocking traffic on private property near the port and fail to disperse after police warnings. Oakland Police Chief said demonstrators also threw objects and bolts at them, and said the use of weapons was necessary to disperse the crowd. He indicated that the rubber bullets were used to respond to direct illegal action and the he longshoremen were caught in the crossfire. A dockworker spokesman reported that police gave two minutes to disperse, then opened fire rather than making arrests. Demonstrators also claim that the police took direct aim at them, rather than firing in the air or at the ground. Thirty-one people were arrested. Demonstrators regrouped and marched to the Oakland Federal Building. In
New York,
USA, protesters targeted the
Carlyle Group, an investment firm with deep connections to the war. About 20 protesters were arrested in a planned civil disobedience, but police then also surrounded and arrested close to 100 people who were simply watching the protest from across the street.
After the fall of Baghdad
Protests sponsored by
A.N.S.W.E.R. were held in
Washington, D.C. San Francisco, and
Los Angeles to demonstrate against the Iraq War three days after the fall of Baghdad. In Washington, the march route took the group of 30,000 past offices of several
mass media organizations, and companies such as
Bechtel and
Halliburton. [http://answer.pephost.org/site/PageServer?pagename=ANS_about_us
Tens of thousands of people demonstrated in
Washington, D.C.,
San Francisco, California,
Reno, Nevada and other cities around the world, in opposition to the
occupation of Iraq. Protesters also advocated for the return of American troops to the United States, and for the protection of civil liberties.
The Washington DC rally attracted 20,000 (BBC estimate) protesters. The protest ended with a rally at the Washington Monument, within sight of the White House. As well as opposing the invasion of Iraq protesters also called for the repeal of the USA PATRIOT Act.
The Washington and San Francisco protests were jointly organized by ANSWER (Act Now to Stop War and End Racism) and United for Peace and Justice.
A pro-war demonstration in Washington organized by Free Republic attracted only dozens (BBC estimate) of people. *
More than 100,000 people demonstrated in
Rome and other
Italian cities during Bush's visit to
Pope John Paul II, who had expressed his opposition to the war in numerous occasions. Ten thousand police patrolled the conference site. The right-wing Italian government under
Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi had supported the war; Italy's largest electric company,
Enel, which is 60 percent owned by the government, forced Radio Città Aperta and Radio Onda Rossa off the air as they were preparing to broadcast extensive coverage of street protests against Bush's visit.
More than 12,000 people, many U.S. citizens, demonstrated against Bush and the Iraq war during his visit to
Paris,
France. In addition,
ANSWER Coalition sponsored a smaller demonstration in
Washington, D.C., marching from the
White House through working-class neighborhoods to the house of
Donald Rumsfeld on Kalorama Road NW near
Embassy Row.
*
In addition, more than 10,000 citizens marched in
San Francisco, as well as a counter-protest with hundreds of pro-war supporters.
About 40,000 demonstrated against the visit of
George W. Bush to the
NATO summit in
Istanbul, about 6,000 in
Ankara,
Turkey.
A large group of people assembled at the Women's Memorial at
Arlington National Cemetery for the National Memorial Procession, described as "A Trail of Mourning and Truth from Iraq to the White House". The theme of the event was "Mourn the dead. Heal the wounded. End the war." Participants were encouraged to dress in black to symbolize mourning.
Cindy Sheehan was among the participants at this demonstration. Speeches were made by veterans, members of military families, family members of fallen soldiers, and others. Following the speeches, participants marched from Arlington National Cemetery to the
Ellipse in
Washington, D.C., carrying cardboard coffins to symbolize the war dead. Following the march, another rally was held, where the coffins carried on the march were placed with more coffins placed at the Ellipse earlier. Following the second rally, 28 people, including
Michael Berg (father of the American civilian contractor
Nicholas Berg who was killed by insurgents in Iraq), were arrested while attempting to deliver the names of fallen heroes to the White House.
*
Approximately 10,000 people attending the Million Worker March in Washington, D.C. conducted a large pro-labor demonstration, with a very heavy additional focus against the war in Iraq as well.
Two protests were held in
Ottawa against George W. Bush's first official visit to Canada. A rally and march in the early afternoon was upwards of fifteen thousand (or 5,000 according to police). An evening rally on Parliament Hill drew another 15,000 and featured a speech by Brandon Hughey, an American soldier seeking refuge in Canada after refusing to fight in Iraq. Bush's stop on
1 December in
Halifax, Nova Scotia drew between 4,000 and 5,000 protesters. Ottawa organizers of the protest were only given two weeks notice of Bush's visit; Halifax organizers were given under a week's notice.
Thousands of people attended multiple protest rallies and marches held throughout Washington, D.C. on the day of George W. Bush's second inaugural to protest the war in Iraq and other policies of the Bush Administration.
Protests to mark the second anniversary of start of the
Iraq war were held across the world, in the
U.S.,
UK,
Canada,
Central America,
South America,
Europe,
Australia,
New Zealand,
Africa,
Asia and the
Middle East. (Some protests were also held on
March 20). In Glasgow, Scotland about 1,000 people (BBC estimate) attended a rally were some of the names of people who had so-far died in the conflict were read out, along with a "name and shame" list of Scottish MPs who backed the war. Speakers included Maxine Gentle, whose soldier brother Gordon was killed in Iraq.
According to a survey (mainly of the reports of organizers), it has been claimed that, across the world, over one million people marched World Social Forum an annual conference of the alternative globalization movement which took place in Porto Alegre, Brazil on
26 January–31, and were supported by coalitions from all over the world [http://www.stopwar.org.uk/march20/" target="_blank" >
*.
An officer of the
German army, Major
Florian Pfaff, was exonorated by the Bundesverwaltungsgericht (German administrative court) after refusing to take part in the development of software likely to be used in the Iraq War.
*
Cindy Sheehan, mother of slain U.S. soldier Casey Sheehan, sets up a protest camp outside the ranch of vacationing president
George W. Bush in
Crawford, Texas. Sheehan, who previously met with Bush in a short encounter before the media that she described as dismissive and disrespectful, demanded that Bush meet with her and stop using the deaths of soldiers including her son as a justification for remaining in Iraq. Other relatives of soldiers, living and dead, and hundreds of supporters joined her throughout the month.
Protests were held in the USA and Europe. Police estimated that about 150,000 people took part in Washington, D.C., 15,000 in Los Angeles, 10,000 in London, 20,000 in San Francisco and more than 2,000 in San Diego. Additionally, in London, organizers claim 100,000 attended similar protests, but police place the figure at 10,000. [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/4275542.stm
Massive popular demonstrations against the U.S.-led war in Iraq, in addition to U.S.-backed economic policies in Latin America, were held in Argentina surrounding the November 4-5 Fourth Summit of the Americas.
Coordinated protests were held to mark the third anniversary of the invasion of Iraq. Major protests occurred in
Baghdad,
Basra,
London,
New York,
Washington DC,
Madrid,
Rome,
Sydney,
Tokyo,
Seoul,
Istanbul,
Toronto and
Dublin. Demonstration organizers in London said this marks the first coordinated protest in Iraq, Britain and the United States.
* More than 500 antiwar events were planned for the week of March 15-21 in the United States; thousands or tens of thousands demonstrated in
San Francisco,
New York,
Los Angeles, and
Chicago.
In Washington DC 200 people marched to the The Pentagon to deliver a faux coffin and bag of ashes to United States Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfield. Two dozen people were arrested for crossing over a barrier around the Pentagon in an act of civil disobedience. They were cited for “failure to obey lawful orders,” according to Cheryl Irwin, a Pentagon spokeswoman. [http://www.flickr.com/photos/mjb/sets/72057594086668921/ Photos
*" target="_blank" > Turn-out for the United States events was damaged by splits between organizing groups such as UFJP and ANSWER.[http://www.zombietime.com/global_day_of_action_march_18_2006/
Thousands from around the south marched in
Atlanta, Georgia from the
King Center to a rally at
Piedmont Park to mark the 3rd anniversary of the Iraq war and the 38th anniversary of the assassination of
Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. The Southern Regional March for Peace in Iraq/Justice at Home was organized by the
April 1st Coalition and speakers included Dr.
Joseph Lowery,
Rev. Tim McDonald, and
Damu Smith.
A coalition of United States-based groups, initiated by United for Peace and Justice, Rainbow/PUSH Coalition, National Organization for Women, Friends of the Earth, U.S. Labor Against the War, Climate Crisis Coalition, People's Hurricane Relief Fund, National Youth and Student Peace Coalition, and Veterans for Peace is planning a national mobilization against the war in New York City on April 29. The same day, ANSWER Coalition is organizing a mass march in Washington, DC. *
See also
General anti-war
External links
Specific demonstrations
Further information
- Stop the War: the story of Britain's biggest mass movement, Andrew Murray and Lindsey German, ISBN 1905192002
2003 Iraq conflict | Protests | Stances and opinions regarding the 2003 Iraq conflict | George W. Bush administration controversies
Wêreldwye protes teen die 2003 inval van Irak | Manifestaciones mundiales contra la guerra de Iraq | Manifestations mondiales contre la guerre en Irak | 全球反对对伊战争大游行