See also:
– Algerian Riots Continue Over Skyrocketing Food Prices And Unemployment:
The cost of flour and salad oil has doubled in recent months, reaching record highs. A kilogram of sugar, which a few months ago cost 70 dinars, is now 150 dinars (£1.28). Unemployment stands at about 10% percent, the government says; independent organisations put it closer to 25%.
Latest Inflation Riot Tally: Algeria, Tunisia, Morocco, Yemen And Jordan
The Fed chairman is 100% confident inflation can be contained. Rapidly spreading rioting (5 countries so far) would take the under on that.
Latest on Tunisia:
Twelve people were killed in overnight clashes in the Tunisian capital Tunis and the northeastern town of Ras Jebel, according to accounts from two medical sources and a witness on Friday.
Ten of the victims were killed after clashes in the capital, two sources from Charles Nicolle hospital told Reuters.
A witness from Ras Jebel, who identified herself as Narjes, said: “I saw two dead people with my own eyes after police fired at youth”.
Tunisian officials could not immediately be reached for a comment. It was not immediately clear whether the shootings took place before or after the country’s president ordered police to stop using lethal force against demonstrators.
And now the violence has spread to Jordan:
Food price protests sweeping across North Africa and the Middle East reached Jordan on Friday, when hundreds of protesters chanted slogans against Prime Minister Samir al-Rifai in the southern city of Karak.
The peaceful protest was held despite hastily announced government measures to curb commodity and fuel prices. Similar demonstrations were held in three other towns and cities across the country, witnesses said.
“We are protesting the policies of the government — high prices and repeated taxation that made the Jordanian people revolt,” Tawfiq al-Batoush, a former head of Karak municipality, told Reuters at the protest outside Karak’s Al Omari mosque.
Three days ago, after riots in Algeria and Tunisia over high prices, unemployment and falling living standards, Jordan announced a $225 million package of cuts in the prices of some types of fuel and of staple products including sugar and rice.
Other Arab countries have taken similar steps. Libya abolished taxes and customs duties on food products and Morocco offered compensation to importers of soft milling wheat to keep supplies stable after a surge in grain prices.
…Morocco (google translated)
Protests against price rises and unemployment moved from Tunisia to Morocco, where the streets of Rabat, yesterday, saw clashes between young protesters and police forces, which tried to prevent them from organizing a demonstration outside the Moroccan parliament, in protest against unemployment and high prices and the cost of living in Morocco
And Yemen:
In Yemen, Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh fired Minister of Oil and Chief Executive, the Yemen Petroleum Company Omar Arhabi, yesterday, due to a lack in the supply of petroleum products, not available in the market, which led to bottlenecks in front of gas stations and the creation of indignation among the citizens.
Not like there is much to add here, but we would like to add that if a rising stock market was indiciative of “wealth” then the citizens of Zimbabwe have to be the richest people in the universe.
Read moreFood And Fuel Riots in Algeria, Tunisia, Morocco, Yemen And Jordan
