Police arrested more than 140 protesters who lay down in the middle of New York's 5th Avenue during this morning's rush hour as part of a "die-in" to protest the US-led war on Iraq.
About 400 anti-war activists converged near Rockefeller Center in midtown Manhattan, many of them lying on their backs near the intersection of 49th Street and 5th Avenue and others holding signs and chanting "No War, No Oil, No Profit".
The two-hour peaceful protest, which closed part of 5th Avenue and snarled city traffic, was the latest of several acts of civil disobedience and anti-war demonstrations in New York and other large US cities.
Since last week, similar demonstrations have closed downtown San Francisco streets with a total of more than 2,000 people arrested.
"I'm against this illegal war of aggression," said one protester. "I think there are ways through diplomatic and multilateral action that we could have disarmed Saddam Hussein."
Several of the demonstrators said they were also protesting media coverage of the week-long war and accused "corporate media of making profits off the war".
In the weeks before the war, as many as 250,000 people demonstrated near the United Nations on February 15th as part of a worldwide anti-war protest. Last Saturday, between 150,000 and 250,000 people marched peacefully down Broadway and 75 were arrested at the end when a small group clashed with police.