National Guard deployed amid curfews in US cities
Trump says US will declare Antifa a terrorist organisation
nWASHINGTON: The United States underwent a fifth consecutive night of violence on Saturday as protesters demanding justice for the death of an African American man in police custody marched in city streets.
From Seattle to New York, tens of thousands of protesters took to the streets demanding tougher murder charges and more arrests over the death of George Floyd, who stopped breathing after Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin knelt on his neck for nearly nine minutes.
Governor Tim Walz of Minnesota, of which Minneapolis is the largest city, said he was mobilising the state’s entire 13,000-strong National Guard.
In Los Angeles, officers fired rubber bullets and swung batons during a testy standoff with demonstrators who set fire to a police car. Confederate monuments in Virginia, the Carolinas and Mississippi were defaced.
Demonstrators nationwide chanted slogans such as “Black
Lives Matter” and “I can’t breathe,” which Floyd, who has become a fresh symbol of police brutality, was heard saying repeatedly before he died.
In New York city, police responded with increasing ferocity in day of escalating clashes with protestors. In videos that have gone viral, a mounted police officer police officer was seen knocking down a protester, a police cruiser drove into a car and police officers used their bicycles to push back protestors.
“Running SUVS in crowds of people should never, ever be normalized. No matter who does it, no matter why,” said Alexandria Ocasio-cortez, the Democratic congressman from New York in a tweet. She went on to criticise the city’s Democratic mayor Bill de Blasio’s earlier comments on the issue as “unacceptable”.
In Washington DC, protesters clashed with Secret Service personnel outside the White House for the second day.
President Donald Trump blamed the extreme left for the violence, including widespread looting and arson in Minneapolis, saying rioters were dishonouring the memory of Floyd.
“We cannot and must not allow a small group of criminals and vandals to wreck our cities and lay waste to our communities. My administration will stop mob violence. And we’ll stop it cold,” he added, accusing the loose-knit militant anti-fascist network Antifa of orchestrating the violence.
On Sunday, Trump tweeted: “The United States of America will be designating ANTIFA as a Terrorist Organization.”
Asked if Trump has plans to address the nation on the issue, National Security Adviser Robert O’brien told CNN Sunday the president had already addressed the issue. He has condoled Floyd’s death. “The President also said that we’re with the protesters who are demanding answers, just like we are, the peaceful protesters. But we’ve got to stop the mob violence.”
Democratic candidate Joe Biden condemned the violence of the protests, but said on Sunday that US citizens had every right to demonstrate.