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AFP
WASHINGTON
NEW ORLEANS took down the first of four controversial Confederate monuments under cover of darkness early Monday morning, the latest removal of a widely perceived racist symbol of white supremacy in the South.
Some city officials in the majority African-American city say they have received death threats.
Workers were seen wearing flak jackets and helmets as police snipers observed from the roof of a nearby parking garage.
"The removal of these statues sends a clear and unequivocal message to the people of New Orleans and the nation: New Orleans celebrates our diversity, inclusion and tolerance,"Mayor Mitch Landrieu said in a statement on Monday.
"The decision to remove these statues was made after a lengthy public process,"the statement added.
The city will remove three more statues -- to Confederate Generals Robert E. Lee and P.G.T. Beauregard and Confederate States of America President Jefferson Davis -- in coming days after a court struck down legal challenges.
They will be relocated to"a place where they can be put in historical context,"the city said.
"This is about showing the whole world that we as a city and as a people are able to acknowledge, understand, reconcile -- and most importantly -- choose a better future,"Landrieu said."We can remember these divisive chapters in our history in a museum or other facility where they can be put in context -- and that's where these statues belong."
The mayor had issued an order calling for the four monuments to be relocated in February 2015 after the city council approved the plan in a 6-1 vote.
In June that year, a white supremacist fatally shot nine African-American parishioners at a black church in S Carolina, prompting a national debate over Confederate symbols in the formerly slave-owning South.
S Carolina took down the Confederate flag from its statehouse soon after. The University of Mississippi also removed its state flag, which included the Confederate emblem.
But other institutions are still debating similar moves.
The Liberty Monument is considered the most controversial of the four New Orleans monuments. A plaque the city added in 1932 said the United States had"recognized white supremacy in the South"since the Civil War.
New Orleans removed the obelisk from its location on central Canal Street more than two decades ago. Challenged by a lawsuit, officials put it back up at its latest, less prominent spot.
Critics say the Confederate monuments should remain because they are part of the city's history.
