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A peaceful protest march
Skopje, wake up!
With the call “It is enough! We call upon the Skopje citizens to WAKE UP from the bad dream and chase away the murderers in our lines!”, a peaceful protest march took place on the territory of Cair municipality. The several thousand people who joined the march, expressed their dissatisfaction on the streets of Cair (from the park in Cair to Bit-Pazar) with the slogans “Stop the weapons” and “Stop the violence”.
The direct occasion for organizing the protest march is the deep disappointment from the tragedy that took place on 18 May in one Internet – cafe near the trade centre “Caircanka”, where three young lives ended and six other people were injured.
The initiative for expressing the dissatisfaction and the protest in that way, came from several organizations, but the association “Skopje, wake up!”, established in the beginning of this month was the main organizer of the protest. Among the first organizations that expressed their support to the protest was the NGO Civil.
“This may the sharpest expression of dissatisfaction from what has been going on for years. The protest was a pure, non-party expression of civil reaction to the gun speech. Fortunately, the protest remained a civil initiative, and without being placed in a political context, showed that the Cair citizens, regardless of their ethnic background, are generally concerned with this huge problem that hangs above their heads. I hope that the protest is an introduction for further, louder expressions of dissatisfaction against the weapons in Macedonia and a result of the four-year NGO work for strengthening the citizens awareness on how the weapons affect their lives and communities”, said Dzabir Derala, “CIVIL” president, also announcing the International week for action against weapons that is to take place in 14 towns in Macedonia.
The Mayor of Cair, Izet Mexiti, took part in the peaceful protest march. “It is time to get reasonable and silence the iron mouths, and make the smell of gunpowder disappear from our atmosphere forever” – is part of the message sent by the Mayor of Skopje, Mr. Trifun Kostovski to the participants in the march.
With their attitudes on the problem with the use of weapons, the Macedonian Orthodox Church and the Islamic Religious Community supported the protest. It was also supported by the UNDP, CARITAS France and the association “Esnaf”.
T.D. |
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