After yesterday's protest against Minister Eugenia Roccella, there were clashes with the police today in Rome at the protest march against the General States of Birth.
The toll is two protesters and four injured officers. The tension arose when a group of demonstrators diverted the route to reach Via della Conciliazione where Pope Francis was scheduled to speak. After leaving the Faculty of Political Sciences at Sapienza which they had occupied late yesterday evening, high school collectives, such as Aracne, university groups, such as Zaum, and transfeminist groups from all over Italy gathered in Piazzale degli Eroi.
But the procession, once it reached Via Leone IV, clashed with the police forces who wanted to prevent it from deviating from the established route: it should, in fact, have reached Piazza Cavour. In the moments of tension that followed, at least six people were injured: certainly two students - according to the kids, a few more - a very young girl at the head, a girl on one side - and four policemen. A sixteen-year-old was instead detained and several participants in the march joined him near the police station to show him their solidarity.
It was a difficult morning for the capital this morning in the Prati district, a stone's throw from the Vatican. The boys, around 250, some very young, shortly after taking to the streets behind a purple banner with a writing against the General States of Natality and "for another education", burned the "Educating for relationships" program of the Minister of Education Giuseppe Valditara , who later commented: "I understand that they wanted to prevent me from speaking when, today, it was announced in all the newspapers that I would not participate. If you think about it, it's quite comical."
In Milan, pro-Gaza students and collectives camped with tents in the central courtyard of the State University for the student intifada and planted a small olive tree in the garden as an "act of liberation". In Naples, however, the students, who left in procession from the Letters headquarters of Federico II, where they had been camping for days with tents in support of the Palestinian cause, reached Piazza Bovio where, in front of the headquarters of an Israeli navigation and logistics company, they painted the large sign on the road with white paint. And tents to demonstrate solidarity with Palestine were also pitched this morning by students in the courtyard of Palazzo del Bo, home of the University of Padua . In Rome instead "against repression" the young people will meet again tomorrow for a static protest at 2.30 pm in Piazza Barberini.
(Unioneonline/D)
