With torchlight marches or simple street walks, demonstrations of solidarity with Ukraine and against the Russian invasion they are multiplying all over the world, from Argentina to Georgia passing through Italy and Japan.
On Saturday, Tokyoites took part in a demonstration denouncing the war in Ukraine. “We must increase the pressure of the world (against Russia). It is a war between dictatorship and democracy,” declared a protester.
Several thousand people gathered across Switzerland on Saturday to support Ukraine and denounce the invasion by Russian forces.
In Geneva, the demonstration gathered more than 1,000 people, according to the police, in the Place des Nations, right in front of the UN headquarters.
The protesters, often wrapped in the Ukrainian flag or dressed in the colors yellow and blue, gathered in the late morning in the shadow of the “Broken Chair”, a monumental sculpture depicting a chair with a broken foot, symbolizing civilian victims of war.
In two cities in the south of France, Marseille and Montpellier, several hundred people marched in a parade shouting “Stop War, stop Putin” or “NATO, act”.
In Rome, a meeting called by various unions and associations brought together more than 1,000 people on Saturday, in a square in the city center around a podium adorned with the inscription: “Against the war”.
The protesters, some families, carried banners with “Make love, not war” or “We want peace.”
The day before, a torchlight march of thousands of participants had marched through the night to the Colosseum.
Some posters showed the Russian president with a bloodstained hand on his face, or compared him to Hitler through the mention: “Do you know how to recognize history when it repeats itself?”
“We have always been close to the Ukrainian people (…) From here, our feeling of helplessness is enormous. We can’t do anything else at the moment,” Maria Sergi, 40, an Italian born in Russia, told AFP.
Vladimir Putin “has done a lot of harm, including to his own people. We have numerous friends who have suffered greatly because of his politics,” he added.
In Athens, on Friday night, in front of the Russian embassy, more than 2,000 people gathered at the call of the Greek Communist Party and the Syriza Radical Left Party. Traditionally pro-Russian, these parties denounce “Russia’s invasion of Ukraine” and an “imperialist war against a people.”
Solidarity demonstrations outside Europe
Taipei, Curitiba (Brazil), New York and Washington have also been the scene of demonstrations.
In Argentina, about 2,000 people, including Ukrainian immigrants and Argentines of Ukrainian descent, demonstrated Friday in Buenos Aires, asking the Russian embassy for “the unconditional withdrawal” of “assassin” Putin’s troops.
Surrounded by “a Ukrainian flag, dressed in traditional costumes, with banners in Spanish, Ukrainian or English saying “Stop the war” or “Putin remove your hands from Ukraine”, the protesters chanted slogans in Ukrainian, such as “Glory to Ukraine, Glory to your heroes” and sang the Ukrainian and Argentine anthems.
“Russians and Ukrainians have a lot in common. So my main feeling is anger. The last thing I imagined was that the Russians would come to kill my people,” Tetiana Abramshenko, 40, who arrived with her daughter in Argentina in 2014, after the Russian annexation of Crimea.
In Montreal, Canada, dozens of people did not hesitate Friday afternoon to brave a snowstorm to protest under the windows of the Russian consulate general.
“Putin, take your hands off Ukraine,” they sang in chorus. “I am against this war,” Elena Lelièvre, a 37-year-old Russian engineer, told AFP. “I hope it is the beginning of the end for this regime.”
With his hair hidden under a green cap, Ivan Puhashov, a computer science student at Montreal University, said he was “terrified” by the situation, calling for additional military equipment to be sent to his country, where his family lives.
Some protesters held a portrait of Vladimir Putin covered with a bloody hand, others carried Ukrainian flags blowing in the wind.
Other demonstrations have also been organized in Halifax, Winnipeg, Vancouver and Toronto in recent days.
Source: Gestion
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