58 — Vanguard, WEDNESDAY, JULY 17, 2013
Trayvon Mar tin: Protests spread to 100 cities in US, UK P
ROTESTS over the ac quittal of George Zimmerman in the death of Trayvon Martin will continue all summer – starting with vigils in 100 cities on Saturday, followed by marches in Florida, and Washington, D.C., the Rev. Al Sharpton announced Tuesday is has also spread to the UK. “Florida will be the battleground of a new civil rights movement,” Sharpton said during a news conference with other clergy outside the Justice Department headquarters. “We are not having a two- or three-day anger fit,” said Sharpton,who is president of the National Action Network and also hosts a show on MSNBC. “This is a movement for social justice.” Meanwhile, one of the six female jurors who ac-
A female protester carrying a banner quitted the Florida neighbourhood watch leader George Zimmerman of murdering Trayvon Martin has revealed that three of the panel originally
wanted to convict him. The middle-aged woman, who is white and has grown-up children, said she and her fellow jurors believed that Martin, an
dead. A spokesman for Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood called the interim government Morsi was ousted on 3 July in what many have said was a military coup. The army said it was fulfilling the demands of the people after mass antiMorsi protests. The swearing-in ceremony was shown live on state television. Gen Sisi already held the defence portfolio, but now also becomes interim prime minister. Moham-
med Ibrahim, who had been appointed interior minister by Morsi, keeps his post. Nabil Fahmy becomes foreign minister and Sherif Ismail is the interim oil minister. Mounir
unarmed black 17-yearold, threw the first punch in the fatal confrontation, leaving Zimmerman in fear of his life. That, she said, was the determining
Egypt’s interim cabinet sworn in A new interim Egyp tian government has been sworn in, with army chief Gen Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, who led the ousting of Mohammed Morsi, becoming deputy PM as well as defence minister. Hazem al-Beblawi is the new PM, under the interim President Adly Mansour. The swearing in followed another night of violence between security forces and Morsi supporters that left seven
Fakhry Abdel Nour, a Christian, is the interim trade and industry minister. There are three women ministers, including Maha el-Rabat, who takes the health portfolio.
brate his 95th birthday on July 18. The United Nations in 2010 had declared the Nobel peace laureate’s birthday as Mandela
demonstrators gathered outside the U.S. Embassy in London to “draw attention to the inherent racism in the American system” and “demand justice for Trayvon Martin,” according to a Facebook event page. The rally was organized by two British leftist groups, the Left Activist Solidarity Network, a network of socialists, communists and anarchists, and Stand Against Fascism, an anti-fascist group. On Tuesday, the National African Caribbean Forum, an African cultural association, says it’s planning a second demonstration at the embassy. Staffers at the embassy in London told U.S. News they were unaware of the protests. Rallies and vigils have been held by Martin supporters in major cities since a Florida jury found Zimmerman not guilty on Saturday night. They have been mostly peaceful, though 14 people were arrested Monday night in Los Angeles after a gathering descended into chaos with some people throwing rocks, attacking people and clashing with police, NBCLosAngeles.com reported.
Italian Senate VP calls black minister “ Orangutan”
A
fresh storm over rac ism has broken out in Italy after a top senator likened the country’s first ever black cabinet minister to an orangutan.
Cecile Kyenge, Italian born in the Democratic Republic of Congo, has been targetted with racial slurs since her appointment as integration minister in April.
World set to mark Mandela’s bir thday T
HE critically ill antiapartheid hero Nelson Mandela may still be confined to his Pretoria hospital bed even as the world prepares to cele-
factor in why the three changed their minds. The woman, with her face blacked out and identified only as juror B-37, insisted that justice had been served. “George Zimmerman is a man whose heart was in the right place, but just got displaced by the vandalism in the neighbourhood and wanting to catch these people so badly that he went above and beyond what he really should have done,” she told CNN’s Anderson Cooper on Monday night. “It just went terribly wrong,” she said. “Things just got out of hand. I think he’s guilty of not using good judgment.” Sharpton said the nationwide action has two goals: urging the Justice Department to move forward with a civil-rights probe of Zimmerman and repealing “Stand Your Ground” self-defense laws that some say made it difficult to win a conviction in the case. Spontaneous marches of varying sizes took place in cities including San Francisco, Chicago, Washington, Atlanta and Philadelphia. Monday afternoon,
Day to encourage people across the world to do good deeds. According to News.com.au, a campaign in memory of Mandela’s 67 years of political activism is being organized where volunteers will spend 67 minutes on hundreds of
community upliftment projects, a minute dedicated for every year of his activism. The inauguration of the Nelson Mandela Legacy Bridge is also scheduled at the icon’s birth village, Mvezo, in the rural Eastern Cape province tomorrow.
Roberto Calderoli, vice president of Italy’s Senate and a member of the antiimmigration Northern League party, made the remarks at a political rally in the northern town of Treviglio on Saturday. “I love animals - bears and wolves, as everyone knows - but when I see the pictures of Kyenge I cannot but think of, even if I’m not saying she is one, the features of an orangutan,” Caldero said. According to local media reports, he added that Kyenge’s success encouraged “illegal immigrants” to come to Italy, and that she should
Cecile Kyenge be a minister “in her own country”. Kyenge is campaigning to make it easier for immigrants to gain citizenship, and she backs a law that would automatically make anyone born on Italian soil a citizen.
Syria mediators ‘killed by pro-regime militiamen’
A Nelson Mandela
T least six mediators have been killed by pro-government militiamen in the Syrian province of Homs, reports say. The men were reportedly trying to broker talks between Sunni Muslims
and members of the minority Alawite sect in the area when they were shot dead. Two of the men were retired military officers, and another was an imam, according to a UK-based
activist group. President Bashar al-Assad’s government is dominated by Alawites, while the uprising has been predominantly Sunni. A video posted online by the UK-based Syrian
Observatory for Human Rights purports to show the bodies of the six men and names them. The Observatory said they were trying to set up talks in an area where fighting erupted last week.