May 25th - International Solidarity

First : London

The Demo in London gathered around 76 activists from Egypt and all around the world, they all had a very 'active spirit' which was reflected on the chanting that rarely stopped.....

Speaking of the chanting, it was led at most of the times today by the outstanding Belinda..... though Belinda is originally from Mauricius she showed extreme passion while leading the chanting that people were asking who is this young passionate Egyptian girl with this unfamiliar accent... ??..... Find below a photo of Belinda leading one of the chants....

The guy at the embassy who was video taping last time was there this time as well, still from behind a curtain... this time though all the young Egyptians led by Khaled started singing "Shayfeenak.... Shayfeenak..... Shayfeenak....." . What is more surprising is that every time they sang "Shayfeenak" this guy shyed away and disappearred behind the curtain.... this was then followed by cheering and clapping.... (he's showing his hand and the video cam on the top right window in the photo) and below is a photo of the protestors cheering after he shyed away behind his curtains....

Remember the Old English Lady I told you about from the Public Meeting, she came to the Demo... I knew that behind her old face there is a wonderful story...... It is Chanie Rosenburg, a lifelong activist and anti-Zionist. In her youth she and her husband, Tony Cliff (founder of the Socialist Workers Party of the UK) fought to unite Jewish and Arab workers in Palestine. After Cliff was imprisoned by the British mandate authorities they fled to London (in 1947).She now sepnds her time monitoring Israeli checkpoints. Next to Chanie is Heba who is a young Egyptian activist who was doing volunteer work in Pakistan before returning back to the UK... she was one of the dynamos during the past few days.....

Heba was not the only one from the Egyptian community in the UK to actively participate, Ramy was supportive and helpful, he has outstanding hand writing that he used to make many of the banners (together with Yassin & Ashraf who have exceptional Arabic hand writing). Ramy was doing volunteer work in Palestine before returning to the UK. He is the guy in the photo below....

Kefaya was represented by Mr. Kazaz, the active movement sent Mr. Kazaz as a representation to show their support for our campaiging effort..... next to Mr Kazaz is Ashraf who was a great help during the last few days as well with his handwriting....

Arwa Assem, an Egyptian member of the NUJ (National Union of Journalists) came with a letter signed by the Secretary General of the Union. The letter was directed to the Egyptian ambassador and it expressed solidarity with the pro-democracy demonstrators, detainees, and movements. It also condemned the brutal attacks on the Journalists in the Cairo streets while they were covering the demonstrations. Photos below shows Mr. Kamal Bayoumi and Araw giong to the embassy to hand in the petitions and the letters to the Ambassador.

Hoda read some translated parts of the letter that was sent by the female detainees (Rasha, Asmaa, Nada) from their prison in Qanater.

Tarek came from Cambridge and Nadia came from Paris (as she missed the Paris Demo) to participate in the demo....

Mr. Kamal Bayoumi talked about the developments in Egypt and the mistakes that were done in dealing with the increased opposition.

Nik Rack from the Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers gave a speech on behalf of the Haldane Society, they signed the petition that was handed to the embassy. He talked about their solidarity with the demands for democracy in Egypt.

Guy Taylor spoke on behalf of the Globalise Resistance Movement....

Chris Nineham spoke on bahalh of Stop the War coalition....

There were representatives from the University of East London as well who came in solidarity with the Judges and the detainees.....

and here are some more photos of the demo....

Second: Seol:

Here are parts of a report by CJ Park and photos are below.....

Dear friends,

Here is a short report of yesterday's protest in Seoul.

On May 26, 1:00PM, around 50 Koreans in support of Egyptian democracy activists gathered in front of the Egyptian Embassy in Seoul . Last time anti-war and human rights activists stood in front of the Egyptian embassy was on 9 June 2005 to protest against the government＊s vicious attack against the Kifaya movement on 25 May, 2005, now dubbed as the ※Abu Ghraib prison on street.This time the protest wraps up for now the 3 day international day of action originally called by the Assembly of the Social Movements which met in the2006 European Social Forum in Athens, Greece. A series of internationalprotests begins in Paris on 24 May and continues on to London, New York,Washington DC, Chicago, Athens, Montreal, Toronto, Beirut, Hague, Cairo on25 May and ends in Seoul on 26 May. Truly it is international solidarity atits finest.At the gathering point, I saw familiar faces and new faces. People who came last year showed anger that the situation in Egypt has gotten worse.However, everyone cheered when they heard news reported by Socialist Workers in UK that a victory was made among political detainees held in the notorious Tora prison outside Cairo. The detainees released a statement condemning prison authorities for their treatment and launched a hungerstrike. After one day the governor relented. They are now free to move between cells and prison authorities have supplied them with food, medicinesand newspapers..

.....As a closing, a representative from Catholic Human Rights Committee readloud the solidarity statement that resolves anti-war and human rights activists in South Korea to continue to spread the words to all circles of Korean society and building solidarity with democracy activists in Egypt. As a human rights activistsaid, "Victory for Egyptian democracy is a major defeat for US imperialism,This means it is a victory for Palestinians, Iraqis, and South Koreansfighting against US imperialism."

Third: New York:

By Shehab Fakhry
Here are more photos of the New York demonstration:
http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/sadooka/album?.dir=fb55re2&.src=ph&store=&prodid=

&.done=http%3a//pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/sadooka/my_photos

The photographer is Sherif Sadek from Akhnaton films [http://akhnatonfilms.com/].

Forth: Montreal:

video of the demo at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x7EcZHWebnE