International Shia News Agency

AFP.com/ Demonstrators in Buenos Aires repudiate Paris attacks

SHAFAQNA – Several hundred people gathered outside France’s embassy in Argentina Sunday in repudiation of the jihadist attacks in Paris that left 17 people dead earlier in the week.Demonstrators broke out in choruses of the Marseillaise and the Argentine national anthem outside the French diplomatic mission in Buenos Aires’s La Recoleta neighborhood.

Signs carried by those who turned out to pay their respects read “Everyone United,” “I am Charlie,” “I am Charlie, I am a police, I am a Jew.”

The references were to Charlie Hebdo, the French satirical weekly where 12 people were killed by two gunmen in the first attack on Wednesday. Four more people were killed Friday a kosher grocery in Paris by a third gunman, who had killed a policewoman the day before.

“The world is united against these madmen, who are a minority, demons who represent nobody,” French ambassador Jean-Michel Casa said.

The demonstration was part of a worldwide outpouring of solidarity with France is it struggles to regain its balance after the sudden attacks by French nationals.

In Paris, an estimated 1.5 million people, including dozens of world leaders, marched through the city’s streets in a defiant show of unity.

French flags were raised in the crowd outside the French embassy here, and flowers were left along its wrought iron fence.

Among those present were leaders of Argentina’s large Jewish community and opposition politicians.

Juan Carr, of the Solidarity Network NGO, asked for a minute of silence before shouting, “Long live solidarity in the world.”

Maruja Colca, a Peruvian whose daughter lives in France, came wrapped in a Peruvian flag.

“I share the pain of the families (of the victims). We all have a right to life. Only God can decide on that. We all think differently but we have to be respected,” she told AFP.

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