The riots that aren't making big headlines

[Partridge]

Turkish Kurds riot after bombing
BBC (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4430022.stm)

There has been a third day of violent protests in the south-east of Turkey close to the border with Iraq. Locals accuse state security officers of planting a bomb in a bookstore which killed one person on Wednesday. Another man died in the clashes that followed.

The government has promised a full investigation as local media suggest gendarmerie intelligence officers may have been acting outside the law.

The media say the bomb may have been aimed at a suspected Kurdish rebel.

Two days after the bombing tensions remain high in Hakkari Province.


Protesters hurled rocks at police and government buildings in Hakkari City on Friday.

Five civilians were injured as police fired in the air and used tear gas in response.

On Thursday there were similar protests in the town of Semdinli where crowds tore down electricity pylons and set fire to a police checkpoint.

Inquiry pledge

The clashes were sparked by an explosion in a local bookstore, where the crowd immediately turned on a man they believed was the bomber.


He was later identified as an intelligence officer with Turkey's security forces.

It is thought the bomb was meant for the shop's owner, who is reportedly linked to the outlawed Kurdistan Worker's Party (PKK).

As anger continues to mount in Semdinli, Turkey's interior minister has called for calm.

He sent a team to the region to investigate but the incident has revived ugly memories of the 1990s when Turkey's fight against Kurdish militants in the area was at its height and its murkiest.

With the press here full of speculation that Turkey's security forces may have reverted to using summary executions, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has promised a transparent inquiry.

He has vowed to uncover the truth and punish whoever is responsible.

[Partridge]

Ethiopia frees detainees after unrest
Independent Online (http://www.int.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=87&art_id=qw1131644520456B231) (SA)

Ethiopian police have released 2 417 people who were detained last week during deadly street riots that rocked the Horn of African nation over fraud allegations in the May general elections, officials said on Thursday.

Those freed are among an unknown number of people arrested in the wake of last week's unrest in the capital Addis Ababa and regional towns that left at least 46 people dead and hundreds injured.

The 2 147 "who were arrested for alleged involvement at various levels in the riot and violence ... were set free as they were not found to be direct actors in the violence," federal police said in a statement.

The statement said 1 779 were released from the Addis Ababa Prison, 285 from Zewai Detention Centre, 225km south of the capital, and 353 from Dedesa Prison, 300km to the west.

The remaining detainees, whose number remains unknown, will be investigated before authorities take action, the statement added.

Last week's violence erupted when the opposition Coalition for Unity and Democracy (CUD) called on Ethiopians to protest alleged fraud in May 15 election which were won by the country's ruling coalition.

On Wednesday, police freed 285 prisoners in a similar move.

The CUD's entire leadership remains in police custody.

[Partridge]

Pakistan: Quake survivors clash with police

The Scotsman (http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=2231492005)

Pakistani police used canes and rifle butts to break up a march by quake survivors. They dragged away and injured some of the demonstrators, who said they were protesting an order to leave a makeshift refugee camp.


Police denied any eviction order had been made, and defended their tactics in putting down protest.

Meanwhile, international lenders estimated the October 8 quake's economic cost at more than five billion dollars.

The violence broke out as about 200 people marched through a street in central Muzaffarabad, one of the towns hit hardest by the quake.

Several men were dragged away, and police were seen kicking some protesters as they lay on the ground.

Earlier, police arrived at the Jalalabad Garden camp in a public park and told quake victims to leave, witnesses said.

"They said they would come with bulldozers, so we protested," said Salim Shah, who was left lying injured by the road after allegedly being beaten. "We have no other place to go."

However, the senior superintendent of the Muzaffarabad police, Yasin Qureshi, denied there was any order to clear the camp.

"We have not been directed to get these people out of here," Qureshi said. There was no immediate explanation for the differing claims.

[Partridge]

Man wounded by suspected police fire during Nazareth riot
Ha'aretz (http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/spages/644458.html)

A man sustained moderate wounds thought to have been caused by police fire during riots that broke out in Nazareth on Saturday at a funeral for a local man shot dead the day before.

The man was taken with an eye injury to Rambam Medical Center in Haifa for treatment. Police internal investigations launched an inquiry into the incident, and will try to establish, among other things, if he was wounded by a rifle bullet or a rubber bullet.

Three policemen were injured in the riot by a firebomb, including Nazareth station police commander Chief Superintendent Avi Haliwa.

Sami Nafafa, 26, was shot dead on Friday and eight others were wounded during a row that broke out between his family and another family in the town.

The riot on Saturday erupted after large police forces moved into the Fakura suburb in Nazareth, as residents began throwing firebombs and set alight houses in the neighborhood during the funeral.

The rival families reached a truce mediated by police on Saturday evening and agreed to refrain from violence for two weeks.

Police believe the two families have an old unsettled financial dispute that led to Friday's incident. Twelve people were arrested after the fight Friday, including the man who was wounded Saturday.

A police investigation revealed that the dispute reawakened on Friday evening after two young drivers argued over who should give way at a crossroad. The argument became a large brawl that police had to disperse.

[Partridge]

Football star's fans on rampage over Liberia poll result
The Times (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-1868385,00.html) (London)

The apparent victory of Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf in the Liberian presidential election turned ugly yesterday as thousands of supporters of George Weah, the former football star, took to the streets in protest. Although official returns gave the Harvard-educated economist about 59 per cent of the vote, making her the first elected woman leader in Africa, throngs of angry young Liberians marched on the National Electoral Commission to demand that Mr Weah be instated as leader.


NI_MPU('middle');
Some hurled stones at soldiers. At one point riot police used batons and teargas to disperse a crowd of several hundred outside the American Embassy. UN helicopters hovered overhead and businesses locked down their shutters.

Mr Weah’s party, the Congress for Democratic Change (CDC), filed an official request to the Supreme Court to stop the count. Mr Weah used a rally of about 1,500 supporters to appeal for calm. “We want no more war. Let us take our time and be peaceful. You have to be courageous because you have not lost the elections,” the former Chelsea and AC Milan star declared. “While we’re looking into the case we want you to remain calm. The streets of Monrovia do not belong to demonstrators. Do not go into the streets to riot.”

Liberia, founded by freed black slaves from America in 1847, has just emerged from a 14-year civil war in which more than 250,000 people died. Pregnant women were often disembowelled by child soldiers who placed bets on the sex of the unborn baby.

A peace agreement signed two years ago brought 15,000 UN peacekeepers into the country and paved the way for these elections.

International observers said that they had found no major irregularities in the conduct of the election. “None of our observers saw any serious problems,” said David Carroll, leader of a team from the Carter Centre and National Democratic Institute.

But Mr Weah’s supporters accused the international community of trying to foist Mrs Johnson-Sirleaf on them.

Steve Quoah, one of Mr Weah’s most senior advisers, said that CDC supporters had been intimidated, and that its workers had been banned from polling stations. His party showed journalists a handful of pre-marked ballots allegedly seized from electoral officials. “These are fraudulent results. There were massive fraud activities going on,” he said. Despite Mr Weah’s appeals his supporters on the streets — many former combatants — threatened violence.

“No Weah, no peace,” they chanted.

“Tell Ellen she will never rule in peace!” shouted one young man. “She will rule in pieces!”

“UNMIL must go!” screamed a woman, referring to the United Nations Mission in Liberia. “We will solve our own problems. When we kill each other, who will survive will survive. That is how we make peace.”

Their cries drowned out those of other Liberians pleading for peace and waving symbolic tree branches. “This is a disgrace,” one hotel worker watching the riots said. “A disgrace to humanity.”

Paul Risely, a UN spokesman, claimed last night that the situation was under control. “We are monitoring the CDC supporters as they return back to CDC headquarters,” he said.

Geoffrey Rudd, the most senior European Union official in the country, said that he had spoken to the protesters at the gate of the EU compound for 20 minutes. “They were pleased that we treated the letter of complaint from Mr Weah with the respect it deserved,” he said. “They said to me that they would not burn cars or injure civilians.” However, many Liberians were taking no chances. Most businesses were closed and people were hurrying to get off the streets.

Mrs Johnson-Sirleaf and Mr Weah were the winners of a first round of elections last month. With 97 per cent of the vote counted Mrs Johnson-Sirleaf had 59.4 per cent of the vote in the run-off, and Mr Weah 40.6 per cent.

[Partridge]

A revealing episode in the Sri Lankan election: troops deployed against striking workers
World Socialist Website (http://www.wsws.org/articles/2005/nov2005/sril-n11.shtml)

The brutal class reality behind all the false promises being made in the November 17 presidential election was graphically exposed by the line up behind the government’s decision to deploy troops against striking health workers on October 27-28.

The current minority government is headed by the Sri Lankan Freedom Party (SLFP) whose candidate Mahinda Rajapakse has been promising to raise the salaries of government workers and to improve the health system. But confronted with a two-day strike by health workers for better pay, his health minister Nimal Siripala de Silva invoked his powers under the current state of emergency and despatched thousands of armed military personnel to public hospitals to carry out their work. Around 300 soldiers and police were deployed at the national hospital in the capital of Colombo alone.

Health Minister de Silva tried to blame the opposition United National Party (UNP), declaring that “this strike has been organised according to the wish of a political party opposing the government.” But the UNP, which is just as hostile to the working class as the SLFP, did not claim responsibility for the strike or come to the defence of the health workers. In fact, UNP candidate Ranil Wickremesinghe had nothing to say at all on the issue.

The silence came as no surprise to health workers who know from their own bitter experience that the UNP is no better than the ruling United People’s Freedom Alliance (UPFA). In 2003, when the UNP led the ruling coalition, it sent thousands of military personnel into hospitals to break a 13-day island-wide strike by health workers calling for a pay rise and an end to salary anomalies. In this case, the UNP did not even bother with the legal niceties of declaring a state of emergency to justify the blatant use of military in civil affairs.

The main demand of the latest strike was that the government live up to its promises, at least partially, made at the general election held in April 2004. In that campaign, the SLFP and its allies, including the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), pledged to increase the salaries of government workers by 70 percent. Immediately after winning the election, however, the promise was deflated to 40 percent, up to a maximum of 9,000 rupees a month ($US88) and spread out over two years—2005 and 2006.

The strike was provoked by a government circular which eliminated the second 20 percent increase due in 2006. While Rajapakse was promising to increase the monthly salary of government workers by 3,000 rupees after the election, his health minister de Silva was declaring that he could not possibly give in to the demand of health workers for the government to honour its previous pledges. “If we give in to their demands all other state sectors would also follow suit,” he said.

The two-day strike paralysed hospitals and medical institutions throughout the island as thousands of health workers, Assistant Medical Officers, Registered Medical Officers, paramedics, laboratory technologists, clerical staff, minor staff, drivers and nurses walked out, defying the government’s threat to deploy the military. The stoppage was organised by the Health Sector Trade Union Alliance (HSTUA), an umbrella organisation of 54 health sector unions, which called a one-day strike on October 19 on the same issue.

The most pernicious role in the latest strike was played by the JVP—a populist party based on Sinhala chauvinism, which at times claims to be “socialist”. Having formed an electoral pact with Rajapakse, the JVP echoed de Silva’s lie that the strike was organised to assist the UNP. Its own All Ceylon Health Services Union (ACHSU) refused to join the strike and pressured other workers not to participate.

The JVP, along with the aides of Health Minister de Silva, Health Ministry management and the military, established an “operation centre” against the strike. Health workers alleged that JVP leaders used crude threats against casual workers to get them to sign the attendance registers. The JVP also brought in outsiders to attempt to give the impression that all was normal in the hospitals.

State-run and private media alike also sought to play down the strike as a failure. Carefully staged-managed TV footage showed hospitals running “normally”. Divaina declared on its front page: “The effect of the health workers strike on patients is minimal. Normal services are being maintained with the assistance of army and navy.” But it was no secret to the public, which in the past has sympathised with the health workers actions, that the hospital system was not functioning.

As for the HSTUA leaders, they were never intent on waging a determined campaign against the government. Far from being in the camp of the UNP, HSTUA officials reached “an understanding” with Rajapakse to call off a proposed countrywide hunger strike and other industrial action. As far as the HSTUA leadership was concerned, the purpose of the campaign was to be limited to extracting a better deal from Rajapakse if he should become the next president.

The track record of the HSTUA leadership demonstrates the bankruptcy of such a political approach. The same leaders called off the 13-day strike in 2003 in return for promises that proved to be empty. The ruling UNP-led coalition finally granted a pay hike of about 40 percent, in instalments, in February 2004, but within weeks President Chandrika Kumaratunga arbitrarily sacked the government. It turned out that about 40,000 provincial council workers—nearly half of all health sector employees—were denied the increase.

Far from going on the offensive against the new SLFP-led coalition that took office in April 2004, the HSTUA suspended all industrial action in July and granted the weak minority government a crucial three-month “breathing space” to allow the health minister time to work out his response to the union demands. The government refused to budge and, as a result, salary anomalies for registered and assistant medical officers are still not resolved.

The response of the political establishment to the health workers strike is a warning of what is in store after the election. There have been a growing number of strikes and protests by bus workers, university workers, railway and postal workers against privatisation and over the escalating cost of living. Whether Rajapakse or Wickremesinghe wins the election, the result will be the same. The next president will rapidly tear up his election pledges and use all available means to crush any opposition by workers, students and farmers.

The Socialist Equality Party and its candidate Wije Dias are the only ones in the election offering a clear cut alternative: instead of a long list of false promises, they present a program of struggle. The SEP insists that workers must mobilise independently of all parties of the ruling class and advance their own class interests on the basis of socialist demands. If capitalism cannot provide a decent living standard for working people, then it should be replaced by a society organised on socialist lines to meet the social needs of the majority, not the profits of the wealthy few.

[Partridge]

Violence follows 'Koran burning'
BBC (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/4431588.stm)

Police in the Pakistani province of Punjab have arrested 90 people after protests against an alleged desecration of the Koran. Police officials say the unrest began after rumours spread that a Christian man had set fire to a library containing copies of the Koran.

The crowd set fire to two churches, two school buildings and some houses.

The incidents took place in Sangla Hill, more than 100km from Lahore, but there are no reports of any injuries.

[Partridge]

Uganda: Police Crush Baganda, Makerere Varsity Riots
AllAfrica.com (http://allafrica.com/stories/200511110443.html)

Kampala was yesterday engulfed in riots, one by Makerere students protesting increased fees and another by Baganda elders challenging the government's proposal to have an elected Katikkiro for Buganda. A first year student of Makerere University was killed and many others sustained injuries during student riots in and around the university yesterday.

Ibrahim Ssengendo died in the fracas along Sir Apollo Kaggwa Road as police tried to quell the strike.

The students were protesting the new functional fees announced by the university administration.

The students also set ablaze some vehicles. Police confirmed that at least three vehicles were burnt. The students also looted goods and cash from shops near the university.

Makerere University recently announced new functional fees structure for all privately sponsored students reflecting over 50% increase in fees in a bid to cater for the rising costs of maintaining the students at campus.

"We cannot allow this kind of broad day robbery imposed on us by Makerere officials. Let the university administration sell off some of its property if it has run short of finance instead of mistreating us," shouted students taking part in the strike.

The strike that started at 6.00am saw students closing all entrances to the university, burning and damaging property in the nearby trading centres.

However, police said that the person who died was not a student but was just passing by when a student mob attacked him.

Three admitted

According to sources at Mulago Hospital, three students had been admitted with bullet wounds.

"Let us set the vehicles owned by the university on fire if Luboobi has refused to understand our problem," students, found near the swimming pool, shouted. Prof. Livingstone Luboobi is the Vice-Chancellor.

An eyewitness who lives in a bungalow near the Arts Faculty building said about 20 young men stormed the gate and entered her compound.

She was at home with two of her housemates, one of them an American medical student.

She said the rioters broke several windows but failed to enter the house. They banged at the front door, which was locked, but didn't discover the unlocked back door.

"I went into my room and hid under my bed. I was sure they were going to come in and start looting," she reporter said.

"This policy must be reviewed immediately without further delay because it threatens the academic freedom of students. Students have an inherent and inalienable right to retake or improve their results without fear or punitive and prohibitive fees," Isaac Ssemakadde, the president of the Makerere University Law Society said.

The rioting students vandalised kiosks along Sir Apollo Kaggwa Road and in Wandegeya before riot police came in at 8.20am. Sir Apollo Kaggwa, Bombo and Makerere Hill roads were partly closed by students after lighting fires in the middle of the three roads.

Hoes and pangas

A shop attendant at Makerere Senior Staff Canteen told Daily Monitor that students broke into the canteen using hoes and pangas.

"They feasted on beers and sodas found in the canteen. Other girls disappeared with a T.V giant screen from the club bar as male students were distributing the general merchandise amongst themselves," she said. "A crowd of over 50 students attacked a coca cola depot afterwards and disappeared with over shs 780,000 in cash after drinking all sodas found inside," she said.

The Guild President Henry Morris Kibalya blamed the strike on the failure of the university administration to temporarily put on hold the new fees.

"We have met the University administration for the last four days to look for ways of halting this strike since students had indicated at the beginning of the semester that they were against the new fees," he said.

"Even last night the Guild Executive met with the administration led by the Vice Chancellor Prof. Livingstone Luboobi but he just said that he can handle whatever the students can do," Kibalya said.

The meeting was also attended by Academic Registrar, Amos Olar Odur, Dean of Students, John Ekudu, Deputy Academic registrar (Academic) Dr Lilian Tibatemwa

"I personally pleaded with Prof. Luboobi to allow us meet the Chancellor and Prime Minister, Prof. Apolo Nsimbabi, but he responded by saying that the situation is firmly under control," Kibalya said. "How can you make a person pay retake fees from Shs 50,000 to over Shs 150,000 for only one paper?"

"But anyway the striking moods have been on for long because the Guild Executive spent the whole of Thursday night removing placards from all the university passages calling on students to shun classes," Kibalya went on.

Prof. Nsibambi while presiding over the recent 49th graduation of Makerere University challenged the administration to always address students' grievances in time before students resort to strikes.

By 11.30am, over 10 people had been arrested and detained at Wandegeya Police Station.

Makerere announced functional fees that are various dues paid to the university in addition to the tuition fees. The hiked fees included application fees, examination fees, transcript fees, graduation fees, identity cards, among others.

New fees

According to the new rates, the application fees for Ugandan undergraduates were increased to Shs 20,000 from Shs 8,000, while the examination fee has gone up to Shs100, 000 from Shs60, 000. Registration fees now stand at Shs100, 000 from Shs50, 000. Students will pay Shs15, 000 instead of Shs11, 200 for their Identity Cards and Shs30, 000 instead of Shs10, 000 for their graduation. Additionally, they will pay Shs20, 000 for transcripts for which they have been paying Shs10, 000. The Research fee of Shs10, 000 has been doubled.

Post graduate students would feel the pinch most as the examination fees for PhD students have gone up to Shs300, 000 from Shs180,000, while Diploma and Masters examination fees have gone up from Shs120,000 to Shs 200,000 per annum. They will also pay ten times more in registration fees (Shs120, 000), up from Shs12, 000. Similar fees hitherto paid by international students have been multiplied twice or thrice.

The developments came as a result of a December 2004 University Council meeting, which recommended an increase in tuition fees for privately sponsored students to between 50 and 80 percent with effect from the 2005/2006 academic year and reach full implementation in the 2008/2009.

In a petition to the Minister of Education dated November 10, 2005, Makerere University students urged government to involve parents and other stakeholders in reviewing the new policy.

[Gold9472]

Wow.

[Partridge]

Two Kenyans shot dead in referendum violence
Reuters
(http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20051111/wl_nm/kenya_deaths_dc_1)
Kenyan police shot dead two opponents of a proposed new constitution on Friday as they sought to disperse a rioting crowd in the latest flare-up of a turbulent campaign ahead of a November 21 referendum.

Two other people were seriously injured.

"The public was surging toward the police with stones and all manner of weapons, and the police shot in defense," local police commander Joseph Mbiithi said, confirming the deaths.

The deaths in Likoni, on Kenya's Indian Ocean coast, brought to at least seven the number of people killed this year during protests and tumultuous rallies over a government-backed plan for a new national charter for the east African nation.

Four people were shot dead near a rally in Kisumu at the end of October, and one died in riots in July in Nairobi.

The latest violence flared on Friday when authorities denied a license for a rally planned by the "No" camp.

Hundreds of disappointed "No" supporters protested, throwing stones and petrol bombs, police said.

Television images showed police officers going on stage to stop the rally, followed by chaotic scenes of people running in all directions as stones rained down and tear-gas was fired.

"NO" CAMP AHEAD IN POLL

"There was a confrontation between the police and members of the public demanding to be addressed by leading lights in the Orange camp," local district police commissioner Mohammed Maalim said, referring to the "No" campaign's symbol.

President Mwai Kibaki's government is leading the "Yes" campaign under the symbol of a banana, while the main opposition and a party in the ruling coalition are championing a "No" vote.

A recent opinion poll showed the "No" camp ahead by 10 percentage points.

The government says a new constitution is long overdue to replace the current charter which dates from Kenya's independence from Britain in 1963. But critics say the 197-page document fails to limit the president's vast powers or curtail tribalism in the nation of 32 million people.

Some analysts see the campaign as a precursor of Kenya's 2007 election, and a galvanized opposition are predicting a "No" vote may derail Kibaki's ruling National Rainbow Coalition, which is already split down the middle over the constitution.

Worried foreign donors have called for an end to violence.

Many Kenyans are furious with their politicians who, instead of explaining details of the complicated constitution document, have been trading insults and sometimes blows among themselves.

Rallies have been dogged by near daily violence, with rival supporters hurling fruit, stones and chairs at each other.

[Partridge]

Three die in Thai raids
The Advertiser (http://www.theadvertiser.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,17184098%255E912,00.html) (Australia) At least three people were killed, two injured and dozens of suspected Muslim insurgents arrested as militants attacked more than 20 government targets in a southern Thai province, officials said.

Scores of militants launched coordinated attacks on such facilities as police stations, road check points and schools in Yala province, police chief Major General Paitoon Choochaiya said.

[Partridge]

Group warns of violent street riots a la Paris
The Daily Tribune (http://www.tribune.net.ph/metro/20051109.met01.html) (The Phillipines)
“Manila is Paris in the making.”

This was the stern warning of the group Youth Demanding Arroyo's Removal (Youth Dare) yesterday as it predicted a scenario similar to the recent and violent street riots in Paris.

“President Arroyo's continued stay in power and the implementation of the expanded value-added tax (e-VAT) are courting unrest. Pockets of resistance may soon arise in Metro Manila and other parts of the country as Filipinos continue to suffer the effects of the e-VAT and issues of legitimacy and corruption in government remain unresolved, Youth Dare spokesman Raymond Palatino said in a statement sent to the Tribune.

He added the Arroyo government is already pushing ordinary Filipinos against the wall with its flawed economic policies and futility.

With stunted wages, Palatino said the controversial e-VAT will certainly have an effect on the already meager income of Filipino families, pushing more households into extreme poverty. He added such situation further erodes the remaining faith and hope of ordinary Filipinos in the government and the system itself.

He warned food riots may also ensue while predicting a drastic upsurge in the number of Filipinos who experience moderate and extreme hunger.

“With prices of basic commodities and services in the upward trend, even food is considered a luxury for poor Filipinos nowadays. It is already a dawdling genocide,” he stressed.

Palatino said the curtailment of civil liberties and the systematic political repression being waged by the government against its critics and the anti-Arroyo movements are also firing up the people's fury against the current administration.

But the worst is yet to come, he added, with the railroading of the anti-terror law which will give Mrs. Arroyo limitless powers.

“It will definitely leave the people no other choice but to fight and resist,” he stressed.

Meanwhile, Palatino told Malacañang to brace up for more protest actions in Mendiola and the University Belt area as students start to go back to their schools this semester.

He said students and youth groups under Youth Dare will stage a big anti-GMA youth protest on Nov. 17 to mark the International Students' Day.

[Partridge]

What a fucked up world we live in....

[Partridge]

Greek anarchists attack French schools, back rioters
Reuters (http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L11671627.htm)

Groups of anarchists broke windows, threw paint and spray-painted slogans at French cultural institutes in Athens and northern Greece in support of rioters in France, Greek police said on Friday.

About 50 people, wearing hoods and helmets and carrying red and black flags, threw stones, spark plugs and bottles filled with paint at the central Athens French Institute on Friday morning, breaking windows and damaging parked vehicles.

Police said there were no injuries and the group dispersed quickly after the attack.

Another group attacked the French institute in the northern city of Thessaloniki on Thursday evening, smashing windows while classrooms were filled with language students.

They spray-painted “Rioters Are Right” on the front of the building.

“They just appeared out of nowhere, I think about 70 or 80 of them. They smashed everything and we just sat there terrified,” one student told reporters.

Poor French suburbs have been hit by two weeks of rioting. French police have arrested hundreds of people in what is considered the most serious unrest since student-led protests in 1968.

[PhilosophyGenius]

Man this is crazy!

[Partridge]

The world is crazy bro

[PhilosophyGenius]

This world may very well come to end unless we get our act together.