Category: Political Issues

Death was very much on my mind; I’d spent the previous day at a family funeral and although the event gave some closure I remained grief-stricken and still rather in shock from the sudden and unexpected death almost two weeks earlier. So coming to ‘The People’s March‘ against gun and knife crime on 20 Sept, my heart went out even more than usual to the mothers and fathers who had lost their sons, to the brothers and sisters of those who had died, and those who had lost their friends.

So many of those marching were the families and friends of young people whose lives were ended prematurely by violent death, and the grief felt by many of those I photographed was impossible to miss. They were stricken and angry and demanding that something was done to stop the killing.

But it is hard to see what can be done, and how marches like today’s event really contribute to this. Effective action would involve huge cultural shifts and a direction of change that would reverse much of what we have seen over the past 50 or so years. The liveliest part of the protest was a Christian group;  black-led churches have played an increasingly important part in the community over the last 50 years but don’t seem to have had a great effect in stopping the growth of gun and knife crime.

This  march from Kennington Park, organised by the Damilola Taylor Trust and supported by the Daily Mirror and Choice FM came at the end of London Peace Week. It turned out to be on a slightly smaller scale than the publicity suggested, with perhaps around a thousand marchers leaving Kennington Park, to join other marchers from Camden for a rally in Hyde Park – which, according to the Mirror was attended by 5,000 people. I left the marchers as they walked out of Kennington Park to make my way to a festival in Stockwell which I hoped would cheer me.

More from the Peoples March on My London Diary.

More than 50 activists turned up for an emergency picket of the US Embassy in Grosvenor Square London on Wednesday 17 Sept called at short notice by the Bolivia Solidarity Campaign and Hands off Venezuela, with the support of Equadorians in the UK, Colombia Solidarity Campaign and Global Women’s Strike.

35 years after a CIA-backed coup brought down the Allende government in Chile, the US are still at it, backing right-wing violence that has killed over 30 supporters of the Bolivian president Evo Morales and setting up a plot to get rid of Hugo Chavez in Venezuela.

Both countries have expelled their US ambassadors in response to these attempts, which seem to be part of a Bush initiative to end his time in office by pulling down any left-wing governments in Latin America. Equador is also under threat from such illegal actions by US agencies.

The US  re-established its Fourth Fleet on July 1; this was disbanded some 50 years ago when the Americans realised there was no longer a threat from the German navy and submarines to allied convoys, and the new fleet is intended to intimidate countries in the Caribbean, Central and South America

Jeremy Dear, Venezuelan flag and armed police guard at US Embassy

There were a number of speeches in English and Spanish, including one by NUJ General Secretary Jeremy Dear. The picket was followed by a rally at the NUJ’s offices with speakers expected to include ambassadors, MPs and union leaders, although I was unable to continue to this.

The area around the US Embassy has been extensively remodelled, establishing a pedestrian area in place of the roadway and also surrounding the building with reinforced bollards to prevent vehicle attacks. It does make it a more pleasant area in which to hold protests.

While the picket was being held, one of the Met’s Jankel armoured Guardian TIV (Tactical Intervention Vehicles) was at the south corner of the area and work was being carried out on one of these bollards. Jankel is a Weybridge-based company (with strong connections to Jordan) that specialises in conversions such as these heavily armoured bomb blast and bullet proof vehicles on a Ford 4×4 truck chassis.  Company founder Robert Jankel, who died in 2005, was earlier noted for his sports and luxury car designs.

These sinister looking vehicles are often used around Heathrow and also carry the specialist firearms officers of CO19 – they can transport 6-8 officers.

More pictures at My London Diary

Protester outside BA’s Waterside HQ near Heathrow

Ayodeji Omatode, an IT consultant living in Kent, boarded a British Airways flight at Heathrow on March 27, 2008, going home to Lagos for his brother’s wedding. Along with other passengers he was appalled at the  maltreatment of a Nigerian man being forcibly deported on the flight and he made his views clear.

BA employees called the police to deal with Mr Omatode, and more than 20 officers boarded the plane and dragged him off; he was handled roughly, thrown against a wall and then into a police van, arrested and held for eight hours. BA banned him from flying with them, didn’t return his fare and only gave him his luggage back a week later – damaged.

Over 130 Nigerians and some other nationals were ordered off Flight BA075 to allow a single man to be deported against his will to Nigeria, surely making it one of the most expensive operations of its kind. According to a report in ‘The Guardian‘, the Nigerian government has received an apology about the incident from the British High Commissioner to Nigeria, with a promise that the British government would ensure such an event did not happen again.

Despite this, the CPS have decided to go ahead with the prosecution of Mr Omotade on a charge of threatening behaviour towards a member of the aircraft crew. The case was due to be heard at Uxbridge Magistrates Court on 18 September, but has now been postponed.

The Respect Nigerians Coalition has demanded that they make a full apology to the 134 Nigerian passengers who were offloaded, and give an apology and appropriate compensation to Mr Omatode. They also ask BA to withdraw the statements made by their employees to the police about him, and to remove the ban on him flying with BA. Finally they have asked for an undertaking that BA will improve its attitude to customers and stop practices that make it appear “arrogant, uncaring and discriminatory.”

Protesters arrive at Waterside

The Respect Nigerians Coalition have called on “all decent people everywhere” to join them in a boycott of BA until the company meets these demands. They got considerable publicity when the picketed the BA AGM earlier this year and a small group of protesters came to the Harmondsworth HQ of BA at lunchtime on Wednesday 17 Sept. They were not allowed on to the BA site at Waterside but set up on the main road just outside the offices.

It looks to me like time for BA to withdraw with as much grace as they can scrape together, but so far they have failed to do so.

Our government has let the right-wing press dictate our immigration policy. Most of the time it’s sheet inhumanity and the misery, suffering and illtreatment it causes are hidden, happening out of mind and sight in places few of us go. When they see it happening, decent people are rightly appalled. Those who act as good neighbours should and protest should be applauded, not persecuted.

More pictures on My London Diary.

Last Saturday I went on a ‘Merchants of Death‘ walking tour led by members of the London branch of the Campaign Against the Arms Trade (CAAT) which visited the offices of companies involved in selling arms and providing mercenaries.  It isn’t surprising, given the nature of their businesses and the close relationship that they have with the government and various ministries that many arms companies choose to have the corporate offices within easy reach of parliament and the government offices clustered around Westminster.   Although as you can see from the map   which includes the sites that we visited, there are more scattered around the London area.

Its perhaps also not surprising that the vast majority of those who walk past these buildings would have no inkling of what goes on inside them – in many cases there was no indication at all of what went on there. Others did have their name small to label one of the several bells, but nowhere was there anything that would reveal their secrets to the casual passer-by. It was as if they were ashamed of what they are doing (but not ashamed enough to stop them making massive profits from wars and unrest.)

Our first call was at the UK Corporate HQ of Lockheed Martin in Manning House, 22 Carlisle Place.  They are the largest arms manufacturer in the world and apparently the senior partner in the Atomic Weapons Establishment, Aldermaston, who will make huge profits from the replacement for Trident.

There was no indication about the organisations that work here on the building, which for around 25 years at the end of the nineteenth century was the house of Cardinal Manning, Archbishop of Westminster.  It’s rather a nice building and gets a few lines in Pevsner‘s Westminster volume.

The bells just say ‘Night’ and ‘Day’. No mention of arms, devastation and hell.

Our next stop, the offices of Aegis Defence Services, was inside the SOCPA zone. The walk organisers had been contacted by police, asking if they would like to apply for permission for a demonstration, but they had declined to do so on the grounds that a walking tour was not a demonstration. As we stood outside the offices of this private military and security company (shared with various others at 39 Victoria St) opposite New Scotland Yard, two police officers rode up on bicycles. They seemed very relieved to be told we were a not a demonstration and jumped back on their bikes and rode away almost before they arrived!

The walk then led up Buckingham Gate, with stops at Rolls Royce (65), QinetiQ (85), Aromor Group (25-28) and General Dynamics (11-12)

QinetiQ produced scandalously huge returns for the Carlyle Group – including George Bush Sr  and James Baker

General Dynamics, the 6th largest defence company in the world started as The Holland Torpedo Boat Company, building the US Navy’s first submarine.

Crossing to go in front of Buckingham Palace, we were stopped by police who objected to the poster being carried at the front of the march. After a short discussion we were allowed to go on so long as this poster was not held up while we were in the park.

You can’t carry placards in the park

unless you hold them down

In St James we apparently visited Boeing UK, though their offices at 16 St James St seemed nameless,

The security man just wanted to make sure we kept off the premises

and an equally anonymous Northorp Grumman at 16 Charles II St, before going back to visit BAe Systems at 6 Carlton Gardens

and then finishing at Matra BAe at 11 Strand.

You can find more about the activities of most of these companies at the CAAT web site and also from War on Want, who have a Corporations & Conflict page and you can also download their report on Corporate Mercenaries along with much other relevant material.

More pictures from the event on My London Diary.

Perhaps the saddest thing for me in the whole of the Mayor’s Thames Festival (and there were also a few delights)  last weekend was this structure in Jubilee Gardens, used for a performance by Urban Freeflow, a professional group of ‘freerunners‘.

I first came across this urban sport a few yards away, with groups of young men developing their skills on the buildings of the Shell Centre and the South Bank complex.  It’s a sport that was started in France, in the Paris suburb of Lisses by David Belle and given the name ‘parkour‘, and most of those involved in it seem very much against the kind of competitive aspect that is being brought into it with sponsorship by Barclaycard.

Parkours on the Shell Centre, May 2004

There are some spectacular parkour videos on YouTube, many of which feature short sequences from the South Bank, but one I can’t resist sharing with you, although perhaps not the most spectacular is Parkour Generations‘s  City Gents, which gives a rather different perspective on the journey to work!

On his blog, ‘traceur’ Ben Nuttall, a student from Sheffield writes: “I’m totally against competition in parkour, it’s completely wrong in the philosophy of the discipline which is about self-improvement, continual progression at a naturally-defined pace, and the achievement of being better than we were yesterday rather than being better than Fred is today. Competition only causes people to find the need to show off, perform stylish flashy moves, and attempt things they are not physically or mentally prepared for and trained for. Competition is about winning and being better than someone else, which is not why we do parkour, and if it is, then what we are doing is certainly not parkour.”

It isn’t an activity I’ve taken a great personal interest in, having absolutely no head for heights – I often find myself shaking too much to take pictures when standing on even very low fences and walls to get a better viewpoint – but the event in Jubilee Gardens seemed to sum up  something about the way that commercial interests increasingly appropriate aspects of our lives in pursuit of profit.

I’d like to make it clear this isn’t a specifically anti-Boris rant. I’ve enough against him for throwing away public money by cancelling the cheap oil contract with Chavez and back-pedalling on congestion charges while pushing up fares – policies which put public transport in the capital at risk.  Thames Day after all was one of Ken’s ideas and I felt much the same about similar events – including many of those in Trafalgar Square – organised during Ken’s time in office, as well as some of those organised by London Boroughs of various political hue.

I didn’t stay to watch the performance, though I’m sure it delighted the crowds. I’ve seen plenty of circus acts and there was one around the corner, as I walked across the Jubilee bridge. On the other side I came across another symbol of our declining nation, newly installed turnstiles at the public toilets on the Embankment. For the moment at least, those in Trafalgar Square remain free – as too is our fine National Gallery there. It’s a great collection and I should visit it more often.

Around thirty demonstrators held a lunchtime vigil outside the London Home Office on Thursday 11 Sept, 2008 to oppose the unfair detention and forced removal of Kurdish Iraqi asylum seekers from the UK, which has resulted in an unknown number of deaths.

Some Kurds have accepted voluntary return to Iraq, often forced on them because they are prevented from working in this country and have to rely on charity of friends and a few small groups supporting them.

One of those who eventually signed to go back was Kalir Salih Abdullah, a former fighter of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) who claimed asylum in Britain in 2000, having fled leaving his family of six in Kurdistan.  He spent five years pursuing his claim for asylum without success, before desperate circumstances here led him to sign voluntary return papers, and he was returned at the end of March 2005.

In Feb 2006 he was kidnapped outside his home, apparently by the PUK, and his family have since been unable to find out what has happened to him. His teenage daughter, traumatised by his disappearance, committed suicide.

The protest at the Home Office included members of the families of two men who died this August. The UK tried to send the dying Mohammad Hussain back to Iraq after 8 years here this May,  but his lawyer made a successful challenge to the order, and he died here on 3 August.

Hussein Ali  was forcibly returned to Kurdistan on 7 August this year. Three days later he committed suicide.

Since 2005, this country has forcibly returned around 500 Iraqi asylum seekers to Kurdistan, claiming despite considerable evidence to the contrary that this was a safe area to which people could be returned without risk. Little information is available about what has happened to most of them – and once they have left Britain there is little evidence that our government gives a damn. Even worse, in July this year they started deporting Iraqi asylum seekers to Baghdad. Of course there are people inside the government and the Home Office who want to treat asylum seekers in a humane fashion, but they are fighting – and largely losing – against policies designed to appease the tabloid press. Two people from the Home Office did come out to accept a letter to Jackie Smith and a folder of evidence.

As I went to take photographs, one of the two police officers came to ask who I was saying “We have to know who is coming to these things.” Well, “NO” I thought, “you have no need to know and no right to know as this is a perfectly legal activity” but handed him my press card and watched as he examined it and wrote down the details in his notebook.  It’s easier not to make a fuss – and I know were I to do so I could be asked to give my name and address – and it would be and offence not to comply – and possibly subjected to a “stop and search.”

I think there is also a perhaps more important point. By paying so much attention to trivial things like people photographing protests such as this, the system gets jammed up with irrelevant data, making it much less likely that important things will be spotted.

 

Next to us on the pavement, under the feet of the demonstrators is a piece of public art in which people are invited (it is continuing for 25 years from its start in 2006) to write a short statement about what being British means to them. Most of the statements seemed to be about the freedoms that we enjoy – to travel, to work etc.  I’m tempted to send in as my contributionto this work: “Because I am British I keep having to show my ID to the police and am likely to be stopped and searched without good reason while doing my job.” But that might just be seen as critical of the Home Office – one of the things that is explicitly disallowed for this art work.

More information on the Coalition Against Deportations to Iraq web site at  and more of my pictures from the event on My London Diary.