With war clouds looming over Iraq, final plans were being made for anti-war rallies across the globe tomorrow in what organisers hope will be the biggest day of pacifist protest in history.
Millions of people are expected to turn out in cities across Asia, Europe, Africa and the Americas amid speculation that a war on Iraq, led by the United States and Britain, is just weeks away.
"This is a tough political movement," said Mr John Rees from the Stop The War Coalition - one of the groups behind tomorrow's demonstration in London that could be the biggest seen in the capital since World War II.
Organisers in London expect the demonstration to attract over 500,000 people to take to the streets.
German unions, rights groups, political associations and youth organisations were gearing up today for a massive weekend protest in Berlin against a war on Iraq, the biggest peace rally here in a decade.
Some 50 groups will lead an expected 80,000 demonstrators on Saturday in an "Alliance for Action on February 15", part of a day of anti-Iraq war protests planned around the globe.
"It will be the most surprising peace mobilisation since the big protests of the 1980s," when the United States deployed missiles in Germany and aimed them at the former Soviet Union, said organiser Mr Peter Strutynski.
Elsewhere in Europe, rallies are planned for Rome -- with a million expected to answer the summons of pacifist, Catholic, union and left-wing organisations -- as well as Madrid, Athens, Istanbul, and Paris.
"Whether or not the war takes place under the aegis of the United Nations, it will be catastrophic for the Iraqi and Kurdish peoples," French organisers said in a statement.
Protesters will be hoping to weigh on the deliberations under way at the United Nations in New York, where the Security Council was Friday hearing a report on Iraq that could trigger a US-led attack.
New York is the focus of the main American anti-war demonstration, with hundreds of thousands expected at a rally near UN headquarters. Protesters will be brought in from up and down the US east coast.
Celebrities expected include actors Danny Glover and Susan Sarandon, South African Nobel Peace Prize winner Archbishop Desmond Tutu, and signer Harry Belafonte -- who has bitterly attacked the US administration.
Relatives of victims of the September 11th, 2001 attacks was also expected.
Marches are planned in Asian cities including Jakarta, Kuala Lumpur, Dili, Hong Kong, Lahore, and Bangkok; and in Cape Town, Johannesburg and Kigali in Africa.
AFP, Reuters