France.......
http://www.france24.com/en/20131102-french-riot-police-use-tear-gas-anti-tax-protesters
http://ca.news.yahoo.com/greeks-fear-more-violence-golden-dawn-members-shot-152230203.html
The demonstrations, which was organized by Portugal’s main union (CGPT), was held on Friday in Lisbon where protesters shouted, “The hour has come for the government to go.”
The crowd also demanded an end to the government’s spending cuts that have been affecting the country over the past three years.
The protest came while lawmakers were preparing to vote on the first draft of the next year’s budget, which includes an additional 3.9 billion euros (USD 5.3 billion) in spending cuts, partly through slashing public sector salaries and pensions.
The union said the budget “destroys jobs, steals salaries and pensions, cuts health, welfare and education."
The new cuts are required by the troika of international lenders - the European Union, the European Central Bank, and the International Monetary Fund - which granted Portugal an emergency loan worth 78 billion euros (about USD 107 billion) after Portugal’s borrowing costs soared to unsustainable levels in 2011.
The demonstration came a day after Portugal’s transport workers held a rally to protest the planned reforms, which also include privatizing the public transport network.
Despite the recent held protests, the Portuguese government has shown no signs of changing its mind about the austerity measures, as it hopes to complete the bailout program by next June.
Parliament is expected to vote on the final draft of the 2014 budget at the end of November.
Analysts believe that the budget will be approved by the parliament where a coalition led by Coelho's conservative Social Democratic Party (PSD) holds a majority.
Meanwhile, labor unions have called for additional demonstrations and work stoppage, including a strike by civil servant workers, to be staged on November 8.
http://www.france24.com/en/20131102-french-riot-police-use-tear-gas-anti-tax-protesters
French riot police use tear gas on anti-tax protesters
Riot police confront with protesters during a demonstration for employment and against the government's controversial "eco-tax", a controversial environmental tax on heavy goods vehicles, on November 2, 2013, in Quimper, western France.Riot police confront with protesters during a demonstration for employment and against the government's controversial "eco-tax", a controversial environmental tax on heavy goods vehicles, on November 2, 2013, in Quimper, western France
Riot police stand guard during a demonstration for employment and against the government's controversial "eco-tax", a controversial environmental tax on heavy goods vehicles, on November 2, 2013, in Quimper, western France.Riot police stand guard during a demonstration for employment and against the government's controversial "eco-tax", a controversial environmental tax on heavy goods vehicles, on November 2, 2013, in Quimper, western France
Riot police stand guard as protesters sit during a demonstration for employment and against the government's controversial "eco-tax", a controversial environmental tax on heavy goods vehicles, on November 2, 2013, in Quimper, western France.Riot police stand guard as protesters sit during a demonstration for employment and against the government's controversial "eco-tax", a controversial environmental tax on heavy goods vehicles, on November 2, 2013, in Quimper, western France
AFP - French riot police fired tear gas at thousands of demonstrators in north-west France on Saturday, after some protesters hurled stones and iron bars at them in a rally against a controversial green tax and layoffs.
Three demonstrators were arrested while four protesters and a police officer were injured after scuffles broke out during the protest on Saturday afternoon.
Protest organisers said 30,000 people, including hauliers, fishermen and food industry workers, had gathered in the town of Quimper in Brittany to demonstrate against an environmental tax on trucks and layoffs, even though the government had earlier in the week suspended the application of the so-called ecotax.
Authorities estimate that 15,000 people joined in the protest.
Some of the protestors pelted police with stones, iron bars and even pots of chrysanthemum, while others burned palettes. Police responded with water cannons and tear gas.
The prefect of the department of Finistere, Jean-Luc Videlaine, blamed the violence on a "marginal group" of right-wing extremists, who he said were believed to be among the protesters.
Before the weekend, Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault had warned against any "spiral of violence" in Brittany, after previous clashes last week during similar demonstrations.
The ecotax, aimed at encouraging environmentally friendly commercial transport, imposes new levies on French and foreign vehicles transporting commercial goods weighing over 3.5 tonnes.
It came under fire from farmers and food sector workers across the country, but especially in Brittany, where the economy is heavily dependent on agriculture.
Even though the government has said the tax would not take effect on January 1 as previously planned, protest organisers say it is not enough, demanding instead a permanent suspension of the tax.
On Saturday, protestors marched under banners such as "Right to work", "Bretons yes, sheep no" and "France is not a cash cow".
Many also wore red caps, a symbol of the anti-tax campaign in Brittany in the 17th century.
"I'm here to defend my job," one of the protestors, Genevieve Tanguy, 37, an estate agent told AFP. "In Brittany, we are united. Personally, I would not hold up with all these taxes."
Another protester, 52-year-old mason Claude Sergent said the taxes "are killing us".
Christian Troadec, one of the main organisers of the rally, called the demonstration "a great success for employment in Brittany".
The ecotax was adopted by Nicolas Sarkozy's centre-right UMP government in 2009, but its implementation has repeatedly been put off.
Officials said the suspension of the tax, which would raise about one billion euros per year, would last at least several months.
Environmentalists slammed the Socialist government for postponing the tax, with Green MEP Jose Bove calling the move "pathetic" and an "incredible retreat".
Greece.....
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By Renee Maltezou
ATHENS (Reuters) - A brazen drive-by shooting that killed two young members of Greece's far-right Golden Dawn party has shocked Greeks and prompted soul-searching about whether the crisis-hit country is slipping into a "cycle of violence".
Greece's anti-terrorism force is investigating whether Friday's rush hour shooting outside the party's offices in Athens was retaliation for a fatal stabbing of an anti-fascism rapper by a Golden Dawn supporter in September, police said.
Rapper Pavlos Fissas's death sparked protests across Greece and a government crackdown on Golden Dawn, which is widely considered neo-Nazi and is blamed for attacks against migrants.
"We cannot let this cycle of violence continue," Makis Voridis, a senior lawmaker in Prime Minister Antonis Samaras's New Democracy party, told Mega TV. "This must end here."
"Twelve bullets against democracy," top-selling daily Ta Nea wrote on its front page on Saturday. "The double cold-blooded murder was a coarse provocation against stability."
The two Golden Dawn supporters, aged 22 and 27 years old, were gunned down in a busy street during the evening rush hour. A third man was seriously injured in the chest and stomach and doctors said he remained in a critical condition.
According to witnesses and CCTV camera footage, the attacker, who had an accomplice, got off a motorbike and shot the victims at close range, police said. Twelve bullets were found at the crime scene from a 9 mm gun.
No one has so far claimed responsibility for the attack.
"The target, the place and the time of the attack are symbolic," said Mary Bossis, professor of international security at the University of Piraeus.
"This act had an audience and those behind it have succeeded in sending the message they wanted."
Golden Dawn, Greece's third most popular political force, urged Greeks to join a memorial service on Saturday evening outside its offices in the northern suburb of Neo Iraklio. Residents began gathering at the site and lay flowers.
INSTABILITY
Politicians who have in the past queued up to pour scorn on Golden Dawn united in condemning the shooting.
"This murder creates a climate of instability and targets democracy," said the leftist Syriza party.
Greece is in the sixth year of a recession that has fuelled anger against its foreign lenders and the political class, blamed by Greeks for bringing the country close to bankruptcy.
Golden Dawn, which rejects the neo-Nazi label but uses a swastika-like emblem and its leader has denied the Holocaust, stormed into parliament last year on an anti-immigrant agenda.
Since Fissas' killing, the party has seen several of its members arrested as part of an investigation into accusations it has been involved in a wave of attacks and crimes. Golden Dawn has denied any wrongdoing and said it had asked for police protection at its offices after receiving threats.
The Greek government has in the past promised to wipe out a party it describes as a "neo-Nazi gang". On Friday, it vowed to bring the killers of the two Golden Dawn supporters to justice.
Small-scale bomb attacks against police, politicians and businessmen are frequent in Greece, which has a history of leftist violence. A prominent fatal shooting like Friday's attack was last seen in 2010, when a Greek journalist was shot dead outside his home.
"Yesterday's killing marked a continuation of political uncertainty and instability in the country," said George Tzogopoulos, analyst at the Athens-based ELIAMEP think-tank.
"These kinds of killings, in the span of only 40 days, are obviously worrying for a country that is the cradle of democracy."
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Portugal......
1000s protest against austerity cuts in Portugal
Fri Nov 1, 2013 4:58PM GMT
1
Thousands of demonstrators have protested in the Portuguese capital city of Lisbon against new austerity cuts in the public sector, calling on Prime Minister Pedro Passos Coelho's government to resign.
The demonstrations, which was organized by Portugal’s main union (CGPT), was held on Friday in Lisbon where protesters shouted, “The hour has come for the government to go.”
The crowd also demanded an end to the government’s spending cuts that have been affecting the country over the past three years.
The protest came while lawmakers were preparing to vote on the first draft of the next year’s budget, which includes an additional 3.9 billion euros (USD 5.3 billion) in spending cuts, partly through slashing public sector salaries and pensions.
The union said the budget “destroys jobs, steals salaries and pensions, cuts health, welfare and education."
The new cuts are required by the troika of international lenders - the European Union, the European Central Bank, and the International Monetary Fund - which granted Portugal an emergency loan worth 78 billion euros (about USD 107 billion) after Portugal’s borrowing costs soared to unsustainable levels in 2011.
The demonstration came a day after Portugal’s transport workers held a rally to protest the planned reforms, which also include privatizing the public transport network.
Despite the recent held protests, the Portuguese government has shown no signs of changing its mind about the austerity measures, as it hopes to complete the bailout program by next June.
Parliament is expected to vote on the final draft of the 2014 budget at the end of November.
Analysts believe that the budget will be approved by the parliament where a coalition led by Coelho's conservative Social Democratic Party (PSD) holds a majority.
Meanwhile, labor unions have called for additional demonstrations and work stoppage, including a strike by civil servant workers, to be staged on November 8.
Italy ....
Anti-austerity protesters clash with police in Rome
Violence breaks out in the centre of the city amid protests demanding improved housing rights
5:22PM GMT 31 Oct 2013
Anti-austerity protesters wearing Guy Fawkes masks and motorcycle helmets clashed with police on Thursday in the centre of Rome.
Police and paramilitary Carabinieri officers in riot gear fired tear gas as protesters attacked them with poles and tried to tip over a police van on a busy shopping street in the middle of the capital.
At least 16 people, including four officers, were injured and eight protesters were arrested, as traffic came to a halt and tourists fled clouds of tear gas.
A police helicopter swooped over central Rome as demonstrators pelted lines of police with eggs and fruit, threw “thunder flash” pyrotechnics and climbed on top of police vehicles.
The protesters were calling for more affordable housing, better wages and improved conditions for immigrants and refugees, tens of thousands of whom live in a twilight zone of semi-legality in Italy, with many forced to squat in disused buildings or sleep rough.
The clashes took place close to the lower house of the Italian parliament, the Chamber of Deputies, and the offices of the prime minister, Enrico Letta.
Paolo Di Vetta, one of the organisers, said the protest had been organised in order to call for action by the government on affordable housing and said police had over-reacted “with their shields and truncheons”. Another demonstration would be organised in the city on Nov 10, organisers said.
Some of the demonstrators organised a sit-in in the piazza in front of parliament, playing bongo drums and unfurling a black banner calling for “Homes and wages for everyone”.
The words, picked out in white, were formed by dozens of Guy Fawkes masks — an image that has become a symbol of anti-establishment protests around the world.
The mayor of Rome, Ignazio Marino, inspected the aftermath of the violence on his bicycle.
Like London’s Boris Johnson, Mr Marino, a surgeon who was elected mayor earlier this year, travels by bike whenever he can, often accompanied by police officers on mountain bikes.
Organisers said Thursday’s protest was a continuation of an anti-austerity march through Rome on Oct 19.
At that earlier protest violence broke out when a hardcore of protesters — mostly young men with their faces obscured by scarves and masks — attacked the Economy Ministry.
They assaulted riot police with sticks and poles and threw bottles and thunder flashes, which made a deafening bang.
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