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Thousands of protesters took to the streets last weekend in Sri Lanka due to the country’s worsening financial crisis and demanded that President Gotabaya Rajapaksa resign.
“People should stand up for their rights. People should dictate terms for these dictators,” Nayana Rozario, a protester told Economy Next.
Another protester said, “For the first time in my lifetime, Sinhalese, Muslims, and Tamils -all joined together to fight against Rajapaksa because we have had enough of corruptions and incompetencies in this country.”
Last week, The Trends Journal reported on the upheaval in the country. (See “NEW WORLD DISORDER: SRI LANKANS TAKE TO THE STREETS.”)
And as we had forecast when the COVID War broke out over two years ago and hundreds of millions of lives and livelihoods were killed… the deeper people fell into poverty and hopelessness, the higher the spike in street demonstrations to protest the lack of basic living standards, government corruption, crime, and violence.
TOP TREND FOR 2021: “YOUTH REVOLUTION”: As we had forecast in December 2020, in 2021, the uprisings and revolutions that were sweeping the world before the COVID War will accelerate dramatically, as billions of people sink deeper into economic despair.
In response, governments will again attempt to use the COVID War as a “legal” justification to prohibit protests.
Thus, we maintain our forecast that protests will escalate into civil wars, and civil wars will spread to regional wars.” The world is not prepared for the “2020 New World Disorder.”
Mahinda Rajapaksa, the Sri Lankan prime minister, urged calm on Monday and said every second that they protest the country is “losing dollars.”
Rajapaksa—like the Canadians during the trucker convoy—accused protesters of insulting the country’s war heroes during their rallies.
“My family and I have received more insults than anyone, but we are seasoned with such insults. But my dear sons and daughters, please do not harass the war heroes who saved our country from terrorism,” he said, referring to the war against the Liberation Tigers for Tamil Eelam (LTTE) insurgents, NDTV.com reported.
The protesters want the president to resign and transfer control of the country away from his family. The family ruled for several decades in the country, and these protesters believe there are more qualified individuals to lead the country out of the mess.
The country had £5.8bn in foreign currency reserves by the end of 2019 and by March 2020 had £1.75bn. The BBC reported that Sri Lanka’s government has to raise $7bn in foreign currency this year to pay down its debt.
Global Movement
WSWS.org reported that the war in Ukraine has increased global volatility and pointed to the wave of violent protests due to the COVID-19 outbreak and the war.
The report pointed out that the UN Food and Agriculture Organization said food prices are expected to increase 12.6 percent from February, which was already the highest since 1990.
One UN official said these price increases for basic staples—like wheat and maize—are similar to the prices seen during the 2008 crisis.
“Ukraine’s grain and wheat harvests as well as Russia’s fertilizer export ban will further constrain food production and throw hundreds of millions into starvation” if the war continues, Arif Husain, the UN World Food Program’s chief economist, said, according to WSWS.org.
The report pointed to a U.S. official who told Politico that the U.S. will continue to struggle to “contain” the deepening global food crisis.
“We see the storm coming and we feel unprepared to deal with it. U.S. diplomatic posts are in close contact with countries where people are at risk of increased food insecurity.”
Latin America Protests
Massive protests broke out in Peru last week over inflation hitting its highest level in 25 years, Reuters reported.
Many in the country have not recovered from the COVID-19 outbreak and yet food, housing, and energy inflation jumped over 11 percent in the past year, according to the report. The report said sugar and food oil also rose 50 percent and 35 percent, respectively.
At least six people have died in protests, authorities told the news outlet.
“The cost of a family’s basic daily needs has brutally gone up,” Marcelo Gonzales, a resident in the country told Reuters.
The WSWS.org report also pointed out that Mexico’s inflation hit its highest in 21 years.
TRENDPOST: As Gerald Celente has often noted, “When people lose everything and have nothing left to lose, they lose it.”