I saw this posted over at Reddit Korea. I highly recommend that anyone traveling to Seoul this weekend avoid this area because the leftists in Korea are quite emboldened now and who knows how they would react to Americans especially USFK servicemembers wandering around their protest:
A left wing rally in the Philippines outside the US embassy has turned violent:
A Philippine police van rammed into protesters, leaving several bloodied, as an anti-U.S. rally turned violent Wednesday at the American embassy in Manila.
At least three student activists had to be taken to a hospital after they were run over by the van driven by a police officer, protest leader Renato Reyes said.
AP Television footage showed the van repeatedly ramming the protesters as it drove wildly back and forth after protesters had surrounded and started hitting the van with wooden batons they had seized from the police.
Police later arrested 23 protesters, who broke into a line of riot police and hurled red paint at the policemen and a U.S. government seal at the seaside embassy.
“There was absolutely no justification for it,” Reyes said of the violent police dispersal of about 1,000 protesters. “Even as the president vowed an independent foreign policy, Philippine police forces still act as running dogs of the U.S.”
The violence happened as the protesters gathered to demand an end to the presence of U.S. troops in the country and to support a call by President Rodrigo Duterte for a foreign policy not dependent on the U.S., the country’s longtime treaty ally.
Duterte was on a state visit to China, where he is seeking to repair relations strained under his predecessor over territorial conflicts in the South China Sea. Duterte is also seeking to expand two-way trade and investments and seek financing for badly needed infrastructure projects. [Associated Press]
According to ABC News this who the protesters were:
The protesters, consisting of students, workers and tribespeople, were demanding an end to the presence of visiting U.S. troops in the Philippines and to support a call by President Rodrigo Duterte for a foreign policy not dependent on the U.S., the country’s longtime treaty ally.
The activists came from the largest left-wing umbrella group called Bayan (Nation), which has organized regular anti-U.S. protests in front of the embassy for decades, most of which are peaceful. [ABC News]
The left wing protesters also claim that they don’t want to be dictated to by China:
Amid an uneasy relationship with the U.S., Duterte has tried to reach out to China and Russia, bringing uncertainty to his country’s long alliance with America.
But the protesters also opposed the president’s effort to lean toward China. “The Philippines will not be dictated on, whether by the U.S. or China,” they said in a statement.
These people obviously live in a fantasy world. What has the US supposedly “dictated” to them? The nearly $200 million in aid dollars or the immediate disaster response relief the US has given the Philippines in the past?
Who is currently dictating to them is the Chinese who are forcibly seizing actual territory from the Philippines. I find it interesting that this group of left wing protesters could not find the time to go and violently protest the seizing of Filipino territory in front of the Chinese embassy.
It looks like the US embassy had some useful idiots stop by recently. If they are so concerned about toxins in South Korea how come they are not busy protesting the companies that deliberately dumped 3000 tons of dangerous chemicals into the Han River for people to drink instead of anthrax spores mistakenly sent to South Korea that infected nobody?:
South Korean police said Saturday that two people were arrested for carrying out an illegal protest in front of the U.S. Embassy in Seoul.
“A man and a woman were arrested after they displayed banners and leaflets calling for ousting U.S. troops from the country,” authorities said. “The protest was never authorized, so they broke the law.”
Police said the two lashed out at U.S. troops for bringing in live anthrax spores into the country earlier in the year. They said both were members of the Corean Alliance, a local civic group, whose headquarters was raided by authorities Wednesday.
The raid was carried out because the group was accused of promoting North Korean ideologies in breach of the anti-North Korea law. [Yonhap]
