George Clooney Has Been Arrested at a Sudan Protest
George Clooney, his father, Nick Clooney and several protesters have been arrested (in plastic cuffs) for protesting at the Sudanese embassy in Washington, D.C. According to the Washington Post, his arrest wasn't exactly unplanned. Clooney, according to the AP, said Friday that he hoped to draw more attention to the issue of Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir blocking food and aid to areas of near the border of South Sudan. The Washington Post explained this morning: "By standing on the embassy’s private property, they’re likely to get cuffed, arrested and charged."
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The Washington Post's Aaron Leiko and James Buck described the scene of the arrest which occurred around 11 a.m.:
Clooney and the group of protesters stepped onto embassy grounds after giving short speeches, at which point they were instructed that they must leave or be arrested. On the third warning, officers told the group they were under arrest, and the protestors lined up to get handcuffed and were removed to a waiting van.
And there's this account from The Guardian:
With his hands cuffed behind his back in white zip-ties, Clooney addressed the plight of "innocent children" in Sudan.
"Stop raping them and stop starving them," he told the media scrum. "That's all that we ask."
Antoni Bassas, the Washington correspondent for Catalonian network TV3, tweeted this photo:
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CNN's Athena Jones, was on the scene as well and captured the crowd of journalists, fans, and protesters on hand to see Clooney:
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Judging by the crush of journalists, fans and the exploding Twitterverse--it certainly looks like Clooney got the attention he wanted.
