London: Groups of demonstrators took to the streets in cities around the world on Friday to both lament and celebrate the inauguration of Donald Trump as US president.
About 200 members of activist groups gathered at nine different bridges along the River Thames in London in the morning to drop banners with messages including "Build bridges not walls," and "United against Islamophobia".
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In Manila, hundreds of protesters led by left-wing activists marched to the US embassy to urge President Rodrigo Duterte to be wary of Trump and to maintain an independent foreign policy in relation to the US.
Chanting "Dump Trump," the protesters burned a US flag near the embassy and also demanded the pull-out of US troops and facilities in the Philippines.
![President-elect Donald Trump at the Lincoln Memorial on January 19.](/web/20170122130230im_/http://www.smh.com.au/content/dam/images/g/t/v/7/o/p/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gtvvd7.png/1484932297124.jpg)
Earlier in Sri Lanka, a small but vociferous group gathered outside the US embassy, carrying placards and chanting slogans denouncing Trump's comments on issues including the environment, war and immigrants.
"We are showing our solidarity with all the people throughout the world who are taking part in protests against president-elect Trump," Siritunga Jayasuriya, leader of the United Socialist Party, said.
Police stepped up security outside the embassy in Colombo as less than 100 people from political parties, civil rights and labour organisations protested for more than an hour.
However, there were others who welcomed Trump, with one of Sri Lanka's Buddhist organisations placing a full-page newspaper advertisement wishing him long life.
![President-elect Donald Trump, his wife Melania Trump and family wave at the conclusion of the pre-Inaugural "Make ...](/web/20170122130230im_/http://www.smh.com.au/content/dam/images/g/t/v/7/m/2/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gtvvd7.png/1484969434478.jpg)
A Hindu right-wing group said earlier in the week it was ready to celebrate Trump's "coronation" on Friday, calling him the "King Of the World".
Members of the Hindu Sena or army in India put a garland on a cut-out of Donald Trump and daubed its forehead with a red mark or tika for good luck.
In Budapest, supporters of Hungary's nationalist Prime Minister Viktor Orban planned a street party for Donald Trump's inauguration on Friday afternoon.
Five people, including Zsolt Bayer, a writer prominent due to his targeting of Roma and migrants, were due to address the event dubbed the "inauguration party for a better world order".
The only EU leader who voiced support for Trump's migration policies, Orban has placed Hungary at the forefront of the strongly anti-immigration wing of Europe during the 2015-16 migration crisis.
Human rights organisation Amnesty International released a statement as Trump prepared to enter the White House, warning that his presidency could mark a major roll-back on hard-fought freedoms both in the USA and across the world.
"It is up to each one of us to fight President Trump's spiteful rhetoric of discrimination, hate and xenophobia," the NGO's secretary general Salil Shetty said.
Several hundred people, most of them expatriate Americans, held a protest against U.S. President-elect Donald Trump in the Japanese capital of Tokyo on Friday, hours before his inauguration in Washington.
Some people held up electric candles and others carried placards reading "Love Trumps Hate" and "Women's Rights Are Human Rights", as they marched along a downtown street.
"Trump presidency gets my blood boiling," said Bill Scholer, an art teacher. "Everything we value could be gone. It's time to speak your mind and concerns and to do our best to salvage the values we cherish in America."
"I grew up in the 1960s, and it feels like we are going backwards, and am very worried that we will lose all of the advances we have made over these years," said Holly Thompson, a writer.
Women's rights activists plan protests in various Asian cities on Saturday.
Trump's presidency is being viewed with caution in some parts of Asia.
He alarmed China by breaking with decades of precedent last month by taking a congratulatory telephone call from Taiwan's President Tsai Ing-wen.
China regards Taiwan as a renegade province and objects to countries interacting with it as a violation of Beijing's "one-China" principle.
Trump has even raised questions about the U.S. position on the principle.
Trump has also criticised China's trade practices and threatened to impose punitive tariffs on Chinese imports.
He has also said he would kill an ambitious Asia-Pacific trade pact, raising questions about the prospects for globalisation and free trade.
AAP, Reuters