How do Iraqi protesters tackle tear gas?

Faced with Iraqi security forces preparing to rain the crowds gathered in Baghdad with tear gas to disperse them, the demonstrators were fully prepared and equipped with plastic buckets, soda cans and gardening gloves.

The two sides confronted the Republican Bridge in the capital, which protesters used to advance from the symbolic Tahrir Square to reach official government buildings in the Green Zone, across the Tigris River.

Primitive defenses
Riot police wearing black uniforms blocked the protesters' progress and fired a barrage of tear gas without using live bullets this time.

After a bloody week of protests earlier this month, demonstrators this time armed with their primitive defenses. Some lifted plastic buckets from the streets, chased the bombs to cover them, and reduced the impact of the gas emitted.

Others, however, put the buckets on their heads, in an attempt to avoid serious head injuries caused by the bombs if they hit them.

Others have found an optimal solution in gardening gloves, as their thickness allows them to pick up hot bombs again and throw them directly at security forces, unless the opportunity exists to kick them.

The most willing among the protesters were those who wore dark blue masks, usually used by painters, to protect themselves from inhaling gas.

The less fortunate of the comrades of the arena, devised primitive mechanisms, by cutting the bottle of Pepsi, and cover their nose and mouths.

"Now if I hit a gas bomb, my eyes will tear a little, but I will not suffocate," says one protester. Even the rainy weather was in the interest of the protesters.

Soft drinks
Tear gases are composed of solid nanoparticles that, when released into the atmosphere, become gases, causing inhalers with various symptoms, ranging from coughing to tear shedding, sometimes causing burns or temporary blindness, and in rare cases leading to continuous vomiting leading to death.

Washing the face with sodas or lemon juice and milk is one of the most important symptom relief products, and demonstrators have been using this technique for years around the world.

Few Iraqis loaded boxes of soft drinks into their cars and drove them to the nearest point of demonstrations before security forces stopped them.

At that point, they start waving to their fellow demonstrators, carrying the boxes and marching to the scene of the confrontation with the riot police. "I convey this to our protesting brothers," says one.

Dozens of people have been killed in the past few days, according to the Iraqi Human Rights Commission, including those who died after being wounded by tear gas. More than 1,700 people, most of them suffocated by the same bombs, were injured.

Demonstrations have resumed since Thursday night, after bloody violence earlier this month, which killed 157 people, mostly live bullets.

But this time, the capital's security forces appear to have orders to rely on tear gas and not to use live bullets.