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UN Meetings Draw Demostrators on Wide Range of Causes

   Carolyn Weaver | New York 22 September 2010

   As  world  leaders meet at the U.N. General Assembly, New York City is
   also  playing  host  to  scores of demonstrations -- one of which even
   included a candidate to be the next General Assembly president.
   It's a scene repeated every September, when the United Nations General
   Assembly opens. Demonstrators rally in the blocks around the U.N., and
   in front of the nearby Waldorf Astoria hotel, where Tibetans protested
   the arrival of Chinese premier Wen Jiabao.
   In the plaza across from the U.N., supporters of China's democracy and
   human  rights  movement  also rallied against Chinese leaders, calling
   for  the release of political prisoners and an end to what they called
   land  grabs  and  economic exploitation. "I think we will have impact,
   gradually.  The  impact may be very small, but it will accumulate over
   time.  And  we  come  here  because  our  voice cannot be heard inside
   China," said protest leader Yang Jianli.
   Like  last  year,  many demonstrations at this year's General Assembly
   are  in  protest  of Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Members of
   the New York Board of Rabbis -- joined by some Christian supporters --
   briefly  blocked  morning  traffic  near the U.N. to draw attention to
   Iran's suspected nuclear capability and its threats toward Israel. One
   demonstrator  who  did not give his name spoke afterward.  "I want to
   prevent a second holocaust, and we are on the verge of a disaster that
   the world has not seen since the 1940s," he said.
   At another anti-Ahmadinejad rally, pro-democracy demonstrators dressed
   in  prison  garb and smeared fake blood on their faces and hands -- in
   reference  to  Iran's  executions of children and women by hanging and
   stoning.
   A  new  cause  this  year  was  a rally to save the Himalayas from the
   effects  of  climate  change.  The message: the snow-capped peaks, the
   source of water for 1.5 billion people, are beginning to melt.
   Senior Nepalese diplomats attending the U.N.G.A. crossed the street to
   join  the  protest.   "Of  course, I came here to show my solidarity,
   because  this  is  an issue of tremendous global importance. Mountains
   are  melting.  If  they  melt,  it's going to cause disaster that will
   affect  hundreds  of  millions  of  people,"  said Kul Chandra Gautam,
   Nepal's  candidate  for  president  of  the U.N. General Assembly next
   year.
   The demonstrators included about thirty Nepalese mountaineers, some of
   whom  danced  to a song by Nepalese musician Prem Raja Mahat. Each has
   climbed  at  least  once  to  the summit of Mount Everest, the highest
   mountain  in  the  world  -- and according to the demonstrators, under
   threat of becoming bare rock.

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