Second survey highlights downturn in support for the Dutch king

DutchNews, April 27, 2022 

Photo: Robin Utrecht 

RVD A second survey has highlighted the downturn in support for king Willem-Alexander and the criticism of the way he acted during the coronavirus crisis. 

Last week, a poll involving 26,000 people for television show EenVandaag showed just 54% have faith in the monarch and now an Ipsos survey for news channel NOS paints a similar picture. 

Just 47% of those in the NOS survey have confidence in the way the king does his job and only similar percentage think he performed well during the past two years. Before coronavirus hit, 75% thought the king was performing well. 

The two years of coronavirus have been particularly damning for the royals, following a string of blunders over holidays, and culminating in a small party for oldest daughter Amalia when she turned 18 during the lockdown at the end of last year. 

The Ipsos survey gave the king a personal score of 6.7 out of 10, which is well down on the 7.7 he scored in 2020. Queen Máxima’s score of 7.6 is virtually unchanged on 2021 but down on her 2020 rating of 8. Seven in 10 of survey respondents said they thought she was doing a good job. 

Despite the criticism, 58% still support the monarchy as an institution, roughly in line with the EenVandaag figure.

The New Normal - Election Special

From Algeria to Hong Kong, a year of anti-establishment rage

Yahoo – AFP, Loïc VENNIN,  December 26, 2019

A small spark can ignite a protest, such as metro ticket increase (AFP Photo/

Johan ORDONEZ)

Paris (AFP) - Angry citizens have swelled the streets of cities across the globe this year, pushing back against a disparate range of policies but often expressing a common grievance -- the establishment's failure to heed their demands for a more equitable future.

While street protests are nothing new, experts say the intense 2019 flare-ups reflect a growing sentiment that the social contract between governments and citizens has broken down, with voters paying the price but unable to affect meaningful change.

"What unites the protests is that all are responding to a sense of exclusion, pessimism about the future, and a feeling of having lost control to unaccountable elites," said Jake Werner, a historian at the University of Chicago.

The financial crisis of 2007-08 in particular, he said, exposed systemic failings and induced years of austerity and insecurity for millions of people.

It also produced an acute sense of unfairness, in particular among young people who see their prospects of earning a decent living slipping away with every price hike or benefit cut.

"What was previously experienced as proper or natural is now increasingly experienced as a form of domination and injustice," Werner told AFP.

Parisians brought the city to a standstill in a demonstration against pension 

overhauls (AFP Photo/Alain JOCARD)

As a result, it often takes only a small move to spark a protest -- in Chile it was a metro ticket increase, in Iran and France it was higher fuel costs, in Lebanon a "WhatsApp tax" -- that balloons into a wider revolt demanding better living standards.

Elsewhere, as in Hong Kong, Algeria and India, calls for greater political freedom have become a potent rallying force.

In Iraq, fury over corruption and unemployment boiled over into fiery clashes which have left hundreds of people dead and forced the prime minister to resign.

"The belief in democracy's capacity to change people's lives is undoubtedly eroding," said Erik Neveu, a sociologist at the Sciences Po political science university in Rennes, western France.

'Rejection of neo-liberalism'

For Olivier Fillieule, a specialist in social movements at the University of Lausanne in Switzerland, this year's protests built on the same dynamics which produced movements as diverse as Occupy Wall Street, the Arab Spring, or the Russian opposition to President Vladimir Putin.

"Don't forget that Time magazine named 'the Protester' its person of the year in 2011," Fillieule said.

Algerians have also been protesting for greater political freedoms (AFP Photo/

RYAD KRAMDI)

"The rejection of neo-liberalism is the main driver of most of these movements," he said, noting that "the state's abdication of some of its responsibilities leaves people alone against the market".

The impression that big companies and the wealthy seem to get a free pass -- despite calls to force multinationals to pay more taxes -- only further inflames the sense that the game is rigged.

"Society is fed up with paying and paying. They've squeezed us like a lemon," Marcela Paz, a 51-year-old teacher, said during a protest in Santiago, Chile in October.

And if the traditional rungs for climbing the social ladder are out of reach, experts say more people will feel that protests, and potentially violence, are the only recourse.

In France, for example, the "yellow vest" anger over high costs of living quickly spiralled into rioting and clashes with police -- and eventually forced the government to pledge billions of euros in tax cuts and wage boosts.

Then in December French unions backed by the "yellow vests" called a nationwide strike to protest against pension reforms, which brought the country to a virtual standstill for several weeks.

Hong Kong has been battered by months of mass rallies and violent clashes pitting 

police against protesters who are agitating for direct popular elections of the 

semi-autonomous Chinese territory's government (AFP Photo/Philip FONG)

'Unaccountable'

Experts say the multitude of long-running protests, some of which have carried on for weeks or even months at a time, could provide mutual energy while also inspiring new movements.

"It is clear that protests and other forms of movement activity have been very much on the rise in recent years, and perhaps this year in particular," said Doug McAdam, a sociologist at Stanford University in California.

And reflecting the distrust of top-down democracy, most movements have rejected leadership, embracing instead a "horizontal" organisation facilitated by social media or as in Hong Kong by secure message apps.

In some countries like Iran and Egypt, authorities have tried to curtain the social movements by cutting off the internet -- India this month cut mobile access in parts of Delhi amid protests against a citizenship law deemed anti-Muslim -- but without much success in the long term.

These are not only "Facebook revolutions", says Geoffrey Pleyers, a sociology professor in Belgium and France. These are profound movements where young people often take the lead, but then become intergenerational, he adds.

France's 'yellow vest' movement eventually forced the government to pledge 

billions of euros in tax cuts and wage boosts (AFP Photo/Alain JOCARD)

The "horizontal" organisation makes it harder for authorities to single out someone to negotiate with, or to arrest, in a bid to quell protesters' anger.

"This demand of dignity is central in the movement since 2011," Fillieule said.

"The question of structuring a movement, and how it will be represented, comes second."

Even if governments give in to certain demands, they risk facing more protests unless they address the anger that sent people to the streets in the first place.

"It's not that the nature of authority changed -- elites are just as unaccountable today as they were ten years ago," Werner said.

"What changed is that elite unaccountability has been exposed, because popular forces are no longer aligned with elites as they once were."

2019: a look back at a year of turmoil

France24 – AFP, 26 december 2019

Paris (AFP) - The year 2019 saw an explosion of demonstrations across the world as people demanded an overhaul of entrenched political systems and action on climate change.

Here is a look back at these and other events that marked the year.

Protests sweep Latin America

On January 23, Venezuela's opposition chief Juan Guaido declares himself interim president, escalating a long-running political and economic crisis.

He is recognised by more than 50 countries, including the United States. But the army backs President Nicolas Maduro and he remains in his post.

In mid-September major demonstrations erupt in Haiti after fuel shortages, demanding the resignation of President Jovenel Moise. Violence claims more than 40 lives.

A metro ticket hike in Chile's capital mid-October is the trigger for protests that claim more than 20 lives before a referendum on reforms is agreed.

Bolivia is gripped by three weeks of demonstrations after President Evo Morales claims to win a fourth term on October 20. Dozens are killed. Morales resigns on November 10 and flees into exile as the government works on new elections.

Ecuador is paralysed by nearly two weeks of protests in October and in Colombia strikes and demonstrations against the right-wing government begin mid-November.

North Africa/Mideast fury

On February 22, unprecedented protests break out in Algeria against a fifth term for frail President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, in power for 20 years.

He loses the army's backing and resigns on April 2. But demonstrations continue, demanding an overhaul of the entire political establishment and rejecting new president Abdelmadjid Tebboune, elected on December 12 in polls marked by record abstention.

In Sudan, the military on April 11 ends Omar al-Bashir's three decades in power, a key demand in four months of nationwide protests.

Demonstrations continue until a hard-won agreement in August sets up a joint governing council to oversee a transition to civilian rule. More than 250 people are killed, according to protesters.

In Iraq, mass demonstrations erupt on October 1 against unemployment, corruption and poor public services, degenerating into violence that claims more than 460 lives.

On December 1, parliament accepts the government's resignation.

In Lebanon, rolling mass protests start on October 17, triggered by plans for a messaging app tax and turning against the political elite. They continue even after Prime Minister Saad Hariri resigns on October 29, with protesters rejecting new premier-designate Hassan Diab, an engineering professor backed by Hezbollah chosen on December 19 to form a government.

Iran sees an explosion of riots on November 15 after a fuel price hike. Authorities crush the unrest but Amnesty International says more than 304 people were killed, most shot by security forces, a toll denied by the authorities.

IS leader killed

After a five-year offensive to seize vast Islamic State (IS) territory in Iraq and Syria, the jihadists were driven out of their last bastion in March by Kurdish-led forces.

On October 27, President Donald Trump announces that IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was killed in a US special forces raid in Syria, blowing himself up as he was pursued.

Boeing MAX grounded

A March 10 Ethiopian Airlines crash leads to the global grounding of Boeing 737 MAX planes. It follows a Lion Air crash involving the same model six months earlier, with 346 lives lost in the two incidents.

Boeing faces investigations and lawsuits, and is forced to upgrade its systems, in a crisis that costs it billions of dollars.

In mid-December production of the plane is suspended. On December 23, Boeing chief Dennis Muilenburg resigns.

Brexit saga

Britain's March 29, 2019, deadline for leaving the European Union following a 2016 referendum is postponed three times, with the British parliament unable to agree to the divorce terms negotiated by Prime Minister Theresa May with Brussels, nor a second accord negotiated by her successor Boris Johnson.

After widely winning early elections on December 12, Johnson gets support at the first reading by the lower house for his accord. He seeks final adoption on January 9, and to leave the EU on January 31, 2020.

First black hole photo

On April 10, astronomers unveil the first photograph of a black hole, a phenomenon they were convinced existed even if it had never been seen before.

Drawn from mountains of data captured two years earlier by telescopes across the world, it shows a supermassive black hole 50 million lightyears away.

Notre Dame burns

On April 15, flames destroy the spire and roof of Paris's beloved Notre-Dame cathedral, but firefighters manage to save the gothic building, while many of its arts, relics and other treasures are rescued.

Amid a global outpouring of emotion, nearly one billion euros ($1.1 billion) is pledged for its reconstruction, which will take years. For the first time since 1803, Notre-Dame does not celebrate Christmas mass.

Iran escalation

On May 8, Tehran announces its first step back from the 2015 nuclear accord -- exactly a year after the United States quit the deal and reimposed sanctions.

Over the next months Iran re-engages components of its nuclear programme that it had halted, including uranium enrichment.

Tensions mount when Washington blames Tehran for a series of attacks on oil tankers in the Gulf from mid-May.

On September 14, Iran is again blamed when major Saudi oil facilities are attacked by Yemen's Huthi rebels, which it supports. It denies involvement.

In six months Tehran has surpassed the stock of enriched uranium, the level of enrichment and heavy water reserves fixed by the accord and modernised its centrifuges.

Hong Kong erupts

June 9 sees the start of the biggest crisis in the former British colony of Hong Kong since it returned to Chinese rule in 1997, with almost-daily pro-democracy protests.

Demonstrations are initially sparked by a now-abandoned attempt to allow extraditions to the Chinese mainland but develop into a popular revolt against Beijing's rule.

On November 24, pro-democracy campaigners win a landslide victory in local elections.

Hottest month ever

July temperatures were the hottest ever recorded, US and European Union authorities announce in August.

Temperature records rise in Europe and the North Pole, and in August, Iceland loses its first glacier to climate change.

Fires ravage Brazil's Amazon and Australia, while Venice is swamped by flooding not seen in decades.

The extreme weather raises climate concerns, and rallies for action, initiated by Swedish teen activist Greta Thunberg, spread worldwide.

US disengagement

On August 2, the US officially quits the Cold War-era Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces treaty (INF) with Russia.

Trump's "America First" regime also strikes out alone by pursuing trade wars with China and the EU. It also withdraw from the Paris accord on climate change and its troops from northeastern Syria.

Trump impeachment bid

On September 24, the Democrats in Congress launch an impeachment enquiry into Trump after claims he pressured Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden, a rival in his 2020 reelection bid.

Trump is impeached in a historic rebuke by the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives on two counts of abuse of office and obstruction of Congress, but conviction is unlikely to pass the Republican-controlled Senate in a trial expected to begin in January.

Turkey moves into Syria

On October 9, Turkey launches an offensive into northern Syria to push back from the border Kurdish fighters it considers "terrorists".

Two days earlier Trump had announced the withdrawal of US troops in the area, leading to charges that Washington had abandoned Kurdish allies who were vital in the battle against Islamic State jihadists.

Turkey halts its operation on October 23 after the US and Russia agree in separate deals to ensure the fighters leave the border region.

Big Tech tackled

On July 24, US regulators fine Facebook a record $5 billion for data protection violations amid mounting concerns about the dominance of it and other internet giants Apple, Amazon and Google.

Criticised for failing to protect consumers as well as over tax and advertising issues, the tech titans come under pressure to reform, with threats of investigation, fines and even dismantlement.

Social crisis in France

France is confronted from December 5 by a three-week standoff between French transport workers and the government over pension reforms, which causes havoc to Christmas travel.

Workers at the national SNCF and Parisian RATP rail and public transport companies walk off the job to protest at the government's plan to meld France's 42 pension schemes into a single points-based one, which would see some public employees lose certain privileges, including early retirement.

Japan anti-high heels campaigner steps up to fight 'glasses ban'

Yahoo – AFP, Kyoko HASEGAWA, December 3, 2019

Yumi Ishikawa, leader and founder of the KuToo movement, is now turning her
attention to glasses (AFP Photo/Charly TRIBALLEAU)

A Japanese woman whose campaign against mandatory high heels in the workplace won broad public support has stepped up her fight against strict corporate dress codes -- including a de-facto ban on women wearing glasses.

Actress and freelance writer Yumi Ishikawa shot to prominence this year with her drive against Japanese office culture, in which high heels are seen as near-obligatory when job-hunting or working in the office.

Known by the slogan "#KuToo" -- a play on words from the Japanese word "kutsu", meaning shoes, and "kutsuu", meaning "pain" -- the campaign was chosen on Monday as one of the buzzwords of the year.

Ishikawa's latest petition to relax the rules, delivered to the labour ministry on Tuesday, has attracted more than 31,000 signatures.

"The root cause of the problem is that (there are companies) that have rules for women only -- such as a ban on wearing glasses or a requirement to wear make-up," the 32-year-old told reporters.

"This practice has to be reviewed," she added.

Campaigners had already submitted a petition to the government in June which called for legislation to declare the obligatory wearing of high heels as harassment.

But Ishikawa said progress had been lukewarm and she was "shocked to see there was no mention of high heels" in the government's draft rules published in October.

An official who received the petition said the labour ministry would "consider the petition as one of the opinions" before making a final decision on new government rules to counter harassment in workplace.

One 28-year-old woman contacted by AFP, who asked to remain anonymous, said glasses were banned at her workplace because they give a "cold facial expression".

"I've been wearing glasses for more than a decade because I suffer from dry eye syndrome. I feel uncomfortable wearing contact lenses and am worried that my eye disease may get worse," said the receptionist.

An official at a major employment agency told AFP that come companies asked receptionists to "refrain from wearing glasses" as part of dress codes that also included a ban on dyed hair or unmanicured nails.

Campaigners have said high heels are akin to modern foot-binding while others have urged other dress codes, such as the near-total donning of business suits for men, to be loosened in the Japanese workplace.

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MPs back female quotas for supervisory boards, VVD votes against

"Listening to the Voice of Spirit" (2) - Feb 20, 2016 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Carroll) - (DNA Efficiency is on average at 35 percent now) - (Text version)

“… With free choice, the percentage of DNA efficiently started to go down as humanity grew. As soon as the DNA started to lose percentage, the gender balance was dysfunctional. If you want to have a test of any society, anywhere on the planet, and you want to know the DNA percentage number [consciousness quota] as a society, there's an easy test: How do they perceive and treat their women? The higher the DNA functionality, the more the feminine divine is honored. This is the test! Different cultures create different DNA consciousness, even at the same time on the planet. So you can have a culture on Earth at 25 percent and one at 37 - and if you did, they would indeed clash. …”

“… You're at 35. There's an equality here, you're starting to see the dark and light, and it's changing everything. You take a look at history and you've come a long way, but it took a long time to get here. Dear ones, we've seen this process before and the snowball is rolling. There isn't anything in the way that's going to stop it. In the path of this snowball of higher consciousness are all kinds of things that will be run over and perish. Part of this is what you call "the establishment". Watch for some very big established things to fall over! The snowball will simply knock them down. …”

Iraq's embattled PM bows out as protesters mourn dead

Yahoo – AFP, December 1, 2019

After a spike in deaths last week, Prime Minister Adel Abdel Mahdi said on
Friday he would submit his resignation to parliament (AFP Photo/AHMAD AL-RUBAYE)

Baghdad (AFP) - The government of Iraq's Prime Minister Adel Abdel Mahdi ended Sunday after two months of violent unrest that has left more than 420 people dead and thousands mourning them in nationwide marches.

As anti-government demonstrators across the strife-torn country massed to honour the fallen activists, parliament met to accept the resignation which the 77-year-old had offered two days before.

While Abdel Mahdi stays on initially to lead a caretaker government, President Barham Saleh will now be asked to name a successor to face the challenge of resolving the political chaos that has engulfed the nation.

The protest movement is Iraq's biggest since the US-led invasion of 2003 toppled Saddam Hussein and installed a democratic system in the oil-rich but poverty-plagued nation.

Tens of thousands have vented their anger at a governing class they despise as inept, corrupt and beholden to foreign powers, especially neighbouring Iran, whose consulate in the city of Najaf was torched last Wednesday.

The rallies spread Sunday from the protest epicentre in Baghdad and the mostly Shiite south to the northern, majority-Sunni city of Mosul, where hundreds of students dressed in black organised a mourning march.

Some protesters cautiously welcomed the departure of the premier, who came to power just a year ago based on a shaky alliance between rival parties, but they demanded far more deep-rooted change.

"Abdel Mahdi should go -- and so should parliament and the political parties and Iran!" said one young demonstrator in the capital.

Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdel Mahdi, whose resignation has been accepted by 

parliament after barely one year in office, will stay on in a caretaker capacity until a 

replacement has been named (AFP Photo/AHMAD AL-RUBAYE)

'Carnival goes on'

Observers said Iraq's fractured political scene will struggle to reach a consensus on a new premier.

With the parliament's main Shiite blocs "fragmented, no 'largest faction exists," wrote Dlawer Ala'Aldeen, president of the Arbil-based Middle East Research Institute.

Even if they agreed on a candidate, he or she would also need the backing of the emboldened street.

"Demonstrators are hard to please," said Ala'Aldeen. "The carnival goes on and, meanwhile, violence continues."

Just before the parliamentary session began, another protester was shot dead in the capital, medical sources said.

But, in a victory for the movement, an Iraqi court sentenced a police officer to death after convicting him of killing demonstrators, the first such sentence in the two months of deadly civil unrest.

The Kut criminal court sentenced the police major to be hanged and it jailed a police lieutenant colonel for seven years over the deaths of seven protesters in the southern city on November 2, judicial sources said.

In Mosul, meanwhile, protesters were marching in solidarity with activists elsewhere in the country.

"It's the least Mosul can give to the martyrs," said Zahraa Ahmed, a dentistry student.

"The protesters are asking for their basic rights so the government should have answered from the beginning."

Previously, most Sunni-majority areas had refrained from protesting, fearing that opposing the central government would earn them the labels of being "terrorists" or supporters of Saddam.

For three years, Mosul was the heart of the Islamic State group's ultra-conservative "caliphate", and much of it still lies in ruins today.

Another student in Mosul, Hussein Kheder, carrying an Iraqi flag, said the whole country was now in agreement politically and that "now the government needs to heed the protesters' demands".

Protesters have hit the streets since early October in the largest grassroots 

movement Iraq has seen in decades, sparked by fury at poor public services, 

lack of jobs and widespread government graft (AFP Photo/Haidar HAMDANI)

'Nobody objected'

Abdel Mahdi had resisted protesters' calls for him to step down over the past two months.

But a crackdown turned the tide this week when more than 20 people were killed in the Shiite shrine city of Najaf, 40 in the hotspot of Nasiriyah and three in Baghdad.

The bloodshed prompted Iraq's influential Shiite spiritual leader, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, to call on parliament to drop its support for the premier.

Iraq's constitution has no provision for the resignation of a premier, and lawmaker Sarkawt Shamsaddin said Sunday that the body did not actually hold a vote.

"The speaker said that the Federal Court was consulted and the understanding is that (there is) no need to vote," he said.

The speaker had then asked if any lawmaker was against the resignation and "nobody objected".

Meanwhile, mourners also marched for the first time in Salaheddin, a Sunni-majority province north of Baghdad.

Eight Shiite-majority provinces also announced a day of mourning during which government offices would remain shut.

Clashes have continued in Najaf, where armed men in civilian clothes have fired on protesters who had torched part of a shrine where a revered religious figure is buried.

Local tribes, still tremendously influential in Iraq's south, tried to mediate a solution.

Meanwhile calm reigned in Nasiriyah, the birthplace of Abdel Mahdi.

Iraq protests ramp up, shutting roads, offices and schools

Yahoo – AFP, November 3, 2019

Demonstrations broke out in Baghdad on October 1 in outrage at unemployment,
poor public services and corruption, quickly spreading to the Shiite-majority
south (AFP Photo/Mohammed SAWAF)

Baghdad (AFP) - Protesters in Iraq's capital and the country's south shut down streets and government offices in a new wave of civil disobedience Sunday, escalating their month-long movement demanding wholesale change of the political system.

Demonstrations broke out on October 1 in outrage over rampant corruption and unemployment in Iraq. They were met with a violent crackdown that left dozens dead.

Since resuming late last month, the protests have swelled again with the support of students and trade unions, who jointly announced a campaign of non-violent resistance on Sunday.

In Baghdad, university-age demonstrators parked cars along main thoroughfares to block traffic on the first day of the working week in the Muslim-majority country, as police officers looked on.

Other students took part in sit-ins at their schools, and the national teachers union extended a strike they began last week. The engineering, doctors and lawyers syndicates have all backed the protests.

"We decided to cut the roads as a message to the government that we will keep protesting until the corrupt people and thieves are kicked out and the regime falls," said Tahseen Nasser, a 25-year-old protester in the eastern city of Kut.

In the southern city of Diwaniyah, a banner hanging on the headquarters of the provincial council proclaimed: "Closed by order of the people".

The government has proposed a string of reforms, but they have had little effect
on those in the streets, who have condemned the political class wholesale
(AFP Photo/AHMAD AL-RUBAYE)

'Government lies'

The government has proposed a string of reforms, including a hiring drive, social welfare plans and early elections once a new voting law is passed.

But protesters have stayed on the streets, condemning the political class wholesale.

"We decided on this campaign of civil disobedience because we have had it up to here with the government's lies and promises of so-called reform," said Mohammad al-Assadi, a government employee on strike in the southern city of Nasiriyah.

Demonstrators there organised sit-ins on bridges leading out of the city, as well as its main streets and squares.

Schools and government offices were closed in Baghdad and half a dozen other cities in the south.

In the oil-rich port city Basra, public schools were shut for the first time since the movement erupted in October.

Protesters also kept closed the highway to the Qasr port, one of the main conduits for food, medicine and other imports into Iraq.

A source at the port told AFP that around a dozen ships had pulled away to take their goods elsewhere on Saturday, after waiting to unload their cargo.

The spreading sit-ins indicate a new phase in the protests, already hailed as the largest grassroots movement in Iraq in decades.

The protests have swelled with the support of students 

and trade unions, who jointly announced a campaign 

of civil disobedience (AFP Photo/Haidar HAMDANI)

Civil society 'recovers'

Under ex-dictator Saddam Hussein, rallies that were not exuberantly supporting him or his Baathist government were banned.

After he was toppled by the US-led invasion of 2003, political parties tussling for influence were the only actors able to draw large numbers out into the streets.

"Iraq's civil society which was undermined by decades of Baathist authoritarianism and sectarianism is recovering," wrote Harith Hasan, a scholar at the Carnegie Endowment's Middle East Center.

But the movement has also been bloodied by the deaths of more than 250 people, the vast majority of them protesters.

On Saturday, medical sources told AFP at least one person was killed and dozens wounded in clashes with security forces near the capital's Tahrir Square, a focal point for demonstrators.

Young protesters have spilt over from Tahrir onto two main bridges leading to the western bank of the Tigris.

They parked cars across roads on Sunday, while large numbers of students and schoolchildren thronged towards the square, AFP journalists said.

Alaa Wissam, a 25-year-old architect, said young people were heading to the square to volunteer their help.

"This thing will help young people to have a role in the change that is happening," she said.

Riot police deployed along the bridges have fired tear gas to keep back protesters, who have dug in to their positions behind their own barricades.

Amnesty International slammed Iraqi forces days ago for using two types of military-grade tear gas canisters that have pierced protesters' skulls and lungs.

Rights groups have also expressed worry over the detention of protesters, journalists and medics.

On Sunday, the Iraqi Human Rights Commission said Saba Mahdawi, a doctor and activist, had been abducted the previous evening after providing medical aid to protesters.

Mahdawi's mother said she had been abducted by "armed, masked men on pick-up trucks" as she headed home from Tahrir late on Saturday evening.

The Commission did not say who may have seized her but urged security forces to investigate the matter and other "organised kidnapping operations" in recent weeks.

It called Mahdawi's abduction "a mark of shame for the whole of Iraqi society".

Later, the interior ministry announced the release of a second demonstrator, seized two days earlier, without providing a name.

Lebanese keep protest alive in northern city of Tripoli

Yahoo- AFP, November 2, 2019

Lebanese protesters wave flags and shout slogans during an anti-government
demonstration at al-Nour Square in the northern port city of Tripoli on
Saturday (AFP Photo/Ibrahim CHALHOUB)

Tripoli (Lebanon) (AFP) - Thousands of Lebanese flocked together in Tripoli Saturday, an AFP reporter said, to keep a protest movement alive in a northern city dubbed "the bride of the revolution".

Despite its reputation for conservatism, impoverished Tripoli has emerged as a festive nerve centre of anti-graft demonstrations across Lebanon since October 17.

The movement has lost momentum in the capital since the government resigned this week, but in the Sunni-majority city of Tripoli late Saturday it was still going strong.

In the main square, protesters waved Lebanese flags and held aloft mobile phones as torches, before bellowing out the national anthem in unison, the reporter said.

"Everyone means everyone," one poster read, reiterating a common slogan calling for all political leaders from across the sectarian spectrum to step down.

Many people had journeyed from other parts of the country to join in.

Ragheed Chehayeb, 38, said he had driven in from the central town of Aley.

"I came to Tripoli to stand by their side because they're the only ones continuing the revolution," he said.

Leila Fadl, 50, said she had travelled from the Shiite town of Nabatiyeh south of Beirut to Tripoli to show her support.

"We feel the demands are the same, the suffering is the same," she said.

In Tripoli, more than half live at or below the poverty line and 26 percent suffer extreme poverty, a UN study found in 2015.

On Tuesday embattled Prime Minister Saad Hariri announced his cabinet would step down.

But it is still unclear what a new government would look like and if it would meet protesters' demands that it include independent experts.

Roads and banks have reopened after nearly two weeks of nationwide paralysis.

Fahmy Karame, 49, called for a "rapid solution to the economic crisis".

"We're waiting for a government of technocrats," he said.

In the Lebanese capital, hundreds protested on Saturday evening after a day of rain.

"Down with the rule of the central bank," they shouted at the top of their lungs, clapping their hands near the institution's headquarters.

Economic growth in Lebanon has stalled in recent years in the wake of repeated political crises, compounded by an eight-year civil war in neighbouring Syria.