Protesters are repressed with gas when trying to enter Buenos Aires

“Hunger doesn’t wait, it’s enough to adjust.” With messages like this, flags and drums, hundreds of members of social movements and left-wing parties demonstrated this Monday (18) in different parts of the country against the government of Javier Milei, denouncing the worsening of the food crisis in Argentina.

Groups of protesters from Greater Buenos Aires tried to march into the capital and were repressed by federal forces. The clashes took place on the Puyerredón and Saavedra bridges, which provide access to the city. The police attacked the protesters with pepper spray and batons. Journalists from the Argentine channel A24 ended up being attacked by police officers.

“Tear gas, fire hydrant trucks and batons. Once again, the government chooses violence against demonstrations and repeats its fury with press workers”, denounced the Human Rights organization Centro de Estudos Legales e Sociais (CELS), following the order of the country's Minister of Security, Patricia Bullrich. , which implemented a protocol to avoid traffic blockages.

The Buenos Aires police were also called and praised by Mayor Jorge Macri, who wrote on the social network X, the former Twitter, that “order cannot be negotiated”. “We prevented several columns of protesters from entering the City of Buenos Aires”, he celebrated, stating that he defends “peaceful coexistence between those who need to move freely to work and study and those who want to demonstrate”.

The ORDER is not negotiated

Thanks to the professional action of the Ministry of Security and Police of the City, this morning, we prevented several columns of picketers from entering the City of Buenos Aires.

For our team, it is a priority that there is coexistence… pic.twitter.com/Wik4cQ6m8A

— Jorge Macri (@jorgemacri) March 18, 2024

The call for protest already defied protocol, proposing blockades in 500 parts of the country, “in view of the government's complete lack of response to the food emergency and the adjustment of the popular economy”. “We have tried all possible channels to find a solution to urgent issues and the only answer we have is repression”, expressed the Union of Workers of the Popular Economy (UTEP), which called for the demonstration and posted scenes of the repression of this situation on the union’s profiles. second.

For weeks, social organizations and left-wing parties have been denouncing the end of sending food to community canteens in vulnerable areas and claim that more and more people are turning to these places trying to have at least one meal a day. Poverty, which was already on the rise in Argentina, has intensified in recent months, with the devaluation of the peso by around 50% and soaring prices.

In December, Javier Milei's government signed a Decree of Necessity and Urgency (DNU) to deregulate several sectors of the economy. With the end of price controls, there was a sharp rise in the value of food and other basic food items since the beginning of the new government.

The current administration states that it will send aid to the population directly, and no longer through the intermediation of organizations and social movements, which it describes as “poverty managers”.