G20 summit protests: Why did protests in Hamburg happen?

Some groups in Germany organised ‘Welcome to Hell’ protests, which were a part of the 30 anti-G20 protests registered in Germany, over the last few weeks.

Protesters, including students, from all across Europe participated in the protest in Hamburg. People from US, Canada, also gathered in the protests.

The common concern of all this protest, and the protests before was ‘capitalist’ agendas of the G20 nations, and not immediate concerns of the public.

In an article on the Guardian, Srećko Horvat, a Croatian philosopher, who came to protest against G20, wrote, “The real problem is the dogmatic slumber of the leaders of the free world, represented at this G20 summit by Merkel, May and others, which is the origin of our current dystopian nightmare (wars, terrorism, the refugee crisis and climate change). In this sense, the current G20 is not just a demonstration of disagreement on all fronts, but – after Hamburg – whether the G20 can continue to exist at all.”

While commenting on the overall transparency of the G20 meetings, a researcher from Toronto University, Kulik also said that press conferences are full of ‘political jargons’, according to The Indian Express.

According to reports, some of the protests on Thursday focused on environmental issues, with many expressing concerns that G20 countries are responsible for approximately 75 percent of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions.

Almost every G20 meeting has seen protests, some them have turned violent. In 2009,before the London summit, the London police drew on a sit-down protest of about 4,000 members. Similar protests were witnessed at Toronto, in 2010 which created a history as 1000 protesters were arrested by police to be sent to detention centres.