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Barking and the River Roding – 2007

Barking and the River Roding: Another post from what now seems to me a distant past, Saturday 3rd February 2007, when I took my Brompton folding bike across London on three trains to Barking. Easy as it is to ride, I think I would find lugging it up and down all the stairs to change trains and enter and exit stations rather too tiring now, 19 years later. There are some very much lighter titanium models now than my ageing steel bike – but at an eye-watering cost. And as well as the bike my camera gear probably put the total weight I was carrying up to more than 20kg.

So this is a ride I’m unlikely to repeat, though I’ve often thought of doing so – but perhaps on foot. And although I describe this as a ride, much of it was a walk pushing the bike, not a good off-road bike and impossible on muddy paths. Fortunately it was mainly dry in February 2007 though some paths were quite overgrown.

As usual I’ve put the account into normal case to make it more readable, corrected the odd typo and made a few comments on things that have changed and have given a link to more pictures on My London Diary than on this page.

Barking and the River Roding

Barking, Ilford & Redbridge

The River Roding runs into the River Thames at Barking Creek. I’d hoped to be able to ride alongside it to the Thames, but although the London Borough of Newham had spent a small fortune on getting ARUP to produce 2.4km of riverside path in 2001-2, it still wasn’t opened for public use. The large and expensive gates at its northern end remain locked. [The path leading to the Beckton Creekside Nature Reserve has apparently since been opened and there a plans for it to go on and no longer be a dead end. But I had to change my plans and instead go north by the Roding.]

I don’t know what it is about Newham and footpaths. At Canning Town, the exit from the station to the riverside path remains firmly closed after the riverside walk was completed some years back, with the end of the bridge over the DLR coming from Tower Hamlets also being fenced off. [Now open, but the path still a dead end in both directions, though there is a new bridge to take you across Bow Creek and so further on.]

This would be the end of The Roding Valley Way, started in 1996, but still largely non-existent, leading to the as yet unbuilt Thames Gateway Bridge and the dream of a park across the river. Don’t hold your breath.

I’d gone to Barking partly to have a look at the Jenkins Lane Car Park underneath the A13 flyover being offered by the London 2012 Olympics developers to relocate travellers from the Clays Lane site. It’s in a kind of wasteland adjoining the Roding, handy for the council yard at the end of the lane, the cinema complex, the sewage works and the new refuse transfer station, and not far from the East Beckton megastores. Just down the road there is still the Horse Sanctuary, a home for neglected old horses. [I think this may have gone.]

It is just possible to force your way along the riverside path north from the Hollywood Bowl and Showcase Cinema, but on a bicycle it’s easier to follow Jenkins Lane under the A13 and then take the new path to the riverside walk and Cuckold’s Point, and its viewing area, with some convenient seats where I sat in the February sun and ate my sandwiches. Unfortunately the path ends at the head of Hand Trough Creek a couple of hundred yards further on, with a long detour under, beside and over the North Circular to reach Highbridge Road and the town dock.

From there you can walk along the river in Tesco’s car park and on from there all the way to the railway line, although it gets rather overgrown. Today I left the path and went through Little Ilford, meeting the river again at the side of the City Of London Cemetery, then going off through Wanstead Park and the Redbridge Roundabout.

From the Redbridge Roundabout going north is another finished section of the Roding Valley Way, although I only followed it as far as the bridge across to Roding Lane South, where I turned south and rode back to Ilford and the trains home.

Remote London has a well illustrated description of walking along my route (and more) in 2023. More pictures from my ride begin here on My London Diary.

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Nine from Around Stepney – 1994

Nine from Around Stepney: I spent a day on Sunday 17th July 1994 walking around Stepney and straying into some neighbouring areas of East London, making almost 300 black and white pictures mainly of streets and buildings, some of which you can see in my Flickr album 1984 London Photographs.

But I was carrying two Olympus OM4 cameras, and one was loaded with Fujicolor film, and I also made a few colour pictures. Here are ten from the single colour film I used on that day. For once I won’t write much about them, partly because I made very few notes about them when I was making them. My colour work at the time was entirely personal work.

*Torn posters, Stepney, Tower Hamlets, 1994, 94-722-42*

*Closing Down Sale, Stepney, Tower Hamlets, 1994, 94-722-43*

*Kings Limousines, Stepney, Tower Hamlets, 1994, 94-722-44*

*Mile End Wholesale, Cash & Carry, Stepney, Tower Hamlets, 1994, 94-722-45*

*Tyre City, F W Woodroff & Co Ltd, Printers, Mile End Road, Stepney, Tower Hamlets, 1994, 94-722-35*

*Tyre City, Mile End Road, Stepney, Tower Hamlets, 1994, 94-722-36*

*Mosaic, Doorway, Globe Road, Stepney Green, Tower Hamlets, 1994, 94-722-21*

*Wig shop, Stepney, Tower Hamlets, 1994, 94-722-22*

*Wig shop, Stepney, Tower Hamlets, 1994, 94-722-24*

An Academy, Shops, a House & Pubs – 1990

An Academy, Shops, a House & Pubs: The final post from my walk which ended in Kentish Town on Sunday February 25th 1990. The first post was Around Finsbury Park – 1990 and the previous post is Factories, Flats, Wesley & The Kinks.

*Doorway, Southampton House Academy, Highgate Rd, Gospel Oak, Camden, 1990, 90-2i-46*

Grade II listed Southampton House at 137 Highgate Road was built in the early 19th century and housed the Southampton House Academy run by Captain John Bickerstaffe. The pub adjoining Southampton House is The Southampton Arms, but was built in 1874, and I think took its name from the house, which is now flats. The pub is legendary among beer (and cider) drinkers and apparently only serves beers from wholly independent breweries. I have no idea why Capt Bickerstaffe called his Academy Southampton House, perhaps he was a native of Southampton.

*The Orientalist, 78, Highgate Rd, Kentish Town, Camden, 1990, 90-2i-31*

The Orientalist was a residue from the International Oriental Carpet Centre which I mentioned in my previous post on this walk, where in 1973 Oriental rug dealers moved to Kentish Town from the PLA Cutler Street warehouses. Most moved out of the area in 1994, but some stayed in premises in Kentish Town. The Orientalist rebuilt this building with a more conventional shop front soon after I made this picture and had a closing down sale in 2025.

*Shops, Kentish Town Rd, Kentish Town, Camden, 1990, 90-2i-26*

WE STOCK SUPLUS GOVERNMENT CLOTHING NEW & PART·WORN
COMBAT TROUSERS FOR ALL OCCASIONS SHIRTS JACKETS·ETC
ACHOICE OF JEANSFOR ALL·THE.FAMILY STONEWASH·SHRUNK
FOOTWEAR FOR ALL PURPOSES ALSOFULL RANGE DR.MARTENS
INDUSTRIAL CLOTHINGBOILER SUITS BIB-BRACE TEE SHIRTS
SUPPLIERS OF ALL·TYPES OF RAINWEARJACKETSCOATS ETC.
SPECIALISTS IN CAMPATINGEQUIPMENT.THENTSSLEEPBAGGAZ

Who could ask for anything more?

*Shops, Kentish Town Rd, Kentish Town, Camden, 1990, 90-2i-11*

‘LOOK IN AT FERME SALES’ states the painting of a man being lifted up by another and pointing with his umbrella on the side of THE BEECH Restaurant – (though why does this have ‘ML’ on its canopy?) This painted has long been painted over and the restaurant is now an estate agents.

*The Assembly House, Leighton Rd, Kentish Town Rd, Kentish Town, Camden, 1990, 90-2i-12*

Another large late Victorian pub built in 1896 to designs by Thorpe and Furniss in a style resembling a French Château and Grade II listed. It replaced an earlier pub on the site which in 1788 had as landlord Thomas Wood.

The Assembly House was where people gathered to go together across the dangerous hills to Highgate in groups because of the frequent attacks on travellers on the route. Wood possibly moonlighted as a highway robber – apparently he was tried but acquitted for the offence – but he died insane in Newgate Prison.

*House, Bush, 27, Leighton Rd, Kentish Town,Camden, 1990, 90-2i-15*

Leighton Road was built at the back of the Assembly House pub garden and this Grade II listed house was built around 1828 when the street was called Gloucester Place. The listing text gives more detail than most, including about the street; “In 1804 it was but a pathway leading from Kentish Town to Islington, with a stile at the eastern end and a bowling green on its north side near where No. 27 Leighton Road now stands; this was probably for patrons of the Assembly House inn located at the corner of Kentish Town Road.” and its early residents; “a Mr Crowe (the original freeholder and builder), and then an architect with family and servants. By 1861, the owner was a Mr Pike, with his family but no servants. Pike made various changes to the house in 1870 … and his story is vividly told in Gillian Tindall’s book, “The Fields Beneath: the History of One London Village“, published in 1977.”

*Shops, Torriano Avenue, Kentish Town, Camden, 1990, 90-2j-61*

Also the listing text for 27 Leighton Road tells us that “At this time the land was owned by one Joshua Prole Torriano” which explains this street name. In 1990 it was a rather run-down area as this picture suggests. The view here is looking towards from the south towards Leighton Road and the pub on the corner at 140 Leighton Road was the Torriano Arms, closed and sold in 1994 and now residential.

Unusually the pub’s name lived on, being taken over by the Rose and Crown, a few doors down Torriano Aveven. A long fight saved this from being converted in turn into flats. In 2014 the Camden New Journal published “Torriano pub closes but will reopen with its original name as The Rose and Crown”.

I made four more pictures on my way back to Kentish Town station, on Leighton Rd and Montpelier Grove but haven’t digitised these. The pictures in these posts are generally around a quarter or so of those I took on my walks.

My next walk was in South London – coming shortly.

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End the War on Rojava – 2026

End the War on Rojava: Last Saturday, 25th January 2026, I photographed thousands of Kurds and supporters marching from the BBC towards Downing Street in an attempt to break the world’s silence as the Trump/USA supported Al Qaeda Islamist Syrian government forces destroy much of the autonomous mainly Kurdish region of Rojava.

After the Syrian revolution began with mass protests against the brutal Assad regime in 2011, on July 19th 2012, three predominantly Kurdish-inhabited areas of north-east Syria declared their autonomy, becoming the democratic ‘Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria’ (AANES), better known as Rojava, although this later grew to include a third of Syrian territory and nearly a fifth of its population.

The area remained committed to the ideas of the Arab Spring and set up a democratic constitution with equality for all ethnic groups. It embodied the the slogan “Jin, Jiyan, Azadî” – “Women, Life, Freedom” and many of the banners and placards on the protest reflected this.

Turkey has for many decaades discriminated against its Kurdish communities, with a denial of Kurdish identity attempting to violently assimilate Kurds. In 1978 Kurds founde the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, PKK, which in 1984 began a militant insurgency against the Turkish state. Following pressure from NATO member Turkey, the New Labour government in 2001 proscribed this as a terrorist organisation, making support of it illegal in the UK.

In a political show trial now taking place at the Old Bailey, six members of London’s Kurdish community are charged with being members of the banned PKK. The trail, largely unreported in the mass media, is a sign of Turkey’s increasing attempt to crush the Kurds and the UK’s further collaboration with its fellow NATO member and in line with an increasing use of terrorism charges to oppose political demonstrations – such as those by supporters of Palestine Action and others who oppose the actions of the Zionist state.

The PKK in 2025 announced an end to its military insurgency, ceremonially burnt some of its weapons and officially disbanded in an attempt by Kurds to make peace with Turkey. But the Turkish response has been to carry out military attacks in predominantly Kurdish areas of Syria and to persuade its NATO allies to take a harder line against the Kurds.

For some years the Kurds had been backed by USA air support in leading the fight on the ground against the Islamic state (ISIS) in Syria, largely ending their control of the area – and the UK had played a part in this too. But the situation changed after an Islamist group succeeded in overturning Assad and becoming the new government of Syria. And Trump and his advisers see Rojava as dangerously socialist if not communist – and would prefer any more conservative regime. The USA has a long record of support for dictators.

Since then the autonomous region has engaged with the government to come to agreement so that the advances in the area particularly in the relations between different ethnic groups and the hugely increased freedom for women can be retained. But it seems now that the government is attempting to put the clock back and impose its Islamist ideas across the country, and to fight – with the aid of Turkey -to do so.

Following a video showing a Syrian soldier proudly holding the braid of a slain Kurdish woman fighter, Kurdish women began braiding their hair in solidarity as an unusual form of protest. In London some carried hair braids and posters with the message “keziya me rimetame” – Our hair is a crown.

Other posters carried the message “2 + 2 = 1” – After the end of the First World War in treaties largely determined by England and France, the Kurdish areas were split between four countries – Turkey, Syria, Iran and Iraq and they were denied their own country, Kurdistan which the slogan states is a single people and country.

*London, UK. 25 Jan 2026. 2+2=1 – Kurdistan is in Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Iran*

Many more pictures in an album on Facebook and available for editorial use on Alamy.

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Regents Park & Beckton Alp – 2008

Regents Park & Beckton Alp – 2008: On Wednesday 30 January 2008 I took two walks in London. The first took me to Regents Park around noon, but I can remember nothing about it – all I have are the pictures that I took with their EXIF time stamps. But I was soon the Tube and the DLR, taking some pictures on my way to Beckton, a visit I wrote about on My London Diary and I’ll reproduce that account below. But first some pictures from Regents Park.

Regents Park, Park Square & Park Crescent

*The gardens in Park Square are private, but it isn’t far to go to walk in Regents Park.*

More pictures at Regents Park, Park Square & Park Crescent.

Beckton Alp and DLR Beckton Branch

Beckton, Newham

So on Jan 30 as it was a rather nice day I took a walk in the alps, or rather the singular alp that London has on offer, at Beckton. Theoretically there are two, but the other is more of a pimple, while the northern alp is 36 metres high.

*A strikingly decorated shed at Gallions Reach*

The gasworks started by Simon Adam Beck on agricultural land in 1868 became the largest in Europe, but closed down in 1967. The LDDC bulldozed all of the rubbish from the site into the two mounds, put a 2m capping, mainly of clay on top, and the larger one became a dry ski slope in 1989.

*The London Eye is one of many London buildings easily seen from the slopes of the Beckton Alp*

Despite the odd landslide the ski slope continued in use until 2001, and there were then plans for a ‘Snowdome’ with real snow on the site. But the developer went bust, leaving the site in a dangerous condition with some exposed waste – which includes various nasty chemicals – acids, volatile hydrocarbons – including carcinogens such as benzene, cyanides.

*From the Beckton Alp, looking roughly east with the flood barrier on Barking Creek at left of picture. The gasholders are from the old Beckton works*

Meanwhile the LDDC had faded away, having done its job of diverting large amounts of public wealth into private pockets, and had handed its problems to the local authority – in this instance, Newham, although the ski slope area is owned by Cresney who have had various ideas, including a possible hotel development on part of the site. It was also one of the shortlisted sites for a large scale artwork in the Channel 4 Big Art project to be shown in April 2008. [Antony Gormley’s plan for the site was never realised.]

*The retail park, with East Beckton and the University of East London*

Although there is still access to the public open space around the alp, the ski slope site and the top of the alp is surrounded by a large fence. However there was a rather convenient hole in this, and since there was no notice telling me to keep out – and a very well-worn path on the other side I went through it.

I carefully made my way to the summit to enjoy the views, before continuing my walk along the northern outfall sewer and then down along various paths through East Beckton to Manor Way and the Gallions Roundabout, where I took my life into my hands to dash across Royal Docks Way to the DLR station

[You can read more detail about the Beckton Alp in a 2023 post ‘What’s in the Beckton Alp‘ on the Reimagining Waste Landscapes site.]

More pictures on My London Diary at Beckton Alp and DLR.

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All photographs on this page are copyright © Peter Marshall.
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Kings Army, Clowns & Chinese New Year – 2006

Kings Army, Clowns & Chinese New Year: Three things I photographed on Sunday 29th January 2006 – and what I wrote back then – with the usual corrections and a few comments.

The King’s Army Whitehall Parade

Whitehall

The King’s Army Annual Commemorative Parade is a colourful but little-known London event [though since 2006 mobile phones and social media have raised its profile] marking the execution of our reigning monarch during the English Revolution, arguably the last time we behaved sensibly towards royalty.

My forebears, being strongly non-comformist, would doubtless have been on the opposite side to the regiments that gather here (and yes, there is a Roundhead Association also a part of the English Civil War Society). But for most of those taking part, the event isn’t about the issues of the day but simply a matter of re-enactment, of trying to look and act the part of those soldiers and ancillaries from the seventeenth century.

*A little weapons training at the start of the parade*

The march starts around St James’s Palace, forming up in the Mall for the march to the Banqueting House where Charles 1 was beheaded on 30 January 1649.

It is an event that seems to receive little official recognition or support, but which has now taken place every year for the last 30 or so years. It is an unusual event in that the regiments are allowed to bear arms in one of the most sensitive parts of the city and when they march through Horse Guards Arch they are apparently saluted by the guards on duty as if they were still a part of the army.

At the Banqueting House there was a short service with a real vicar, as well as the presentation of various commissions and awards. [But diappointingly no beheading.] Then the army marched away to be dismissed and we took the opportunity to beat them to the pub, which was shortly after filled with people in seventeenth century dress, and, because this is London after all, some of our pearly kings and queens who were up west for the Chinese New Year.

Many more pictures start here on My London Diary.

Rebel Clowns not demonstrating?

Trafalgar Square

As we came into Trafalgar Square we met some ‘rebel clowns’ protesting against the Serious Organised Crime And Police Act 2005, which was designed to get rid of Brian Haw from Parliament Square. Unfortunately those actually drafting the bill decided it should not be made retrospective, and the government to their amazement found that Brian’s protest wasn’t covered by it. (and yes, he’s still there – and I went along to have a short word with him.) [Later the courts decided that despite what the law said, the government had meant it to apply to Brian, so it did, and he could only protest on the pavement.]

However the rest of us have lost our democratic right to “demonstrate without authorisation” within 1km of parliament. Three days earlier they had demonstrated with this same banner in Parliament Square. The police had come up to talk to the clowns, and had then gone away confused without making an arrest.
[No more pictures.]

Chinese New Year of the Dog

Soho

Across the road in Trafalgar Square and beyond through most of Soho, the Chinese New Year of the Dog was being celebrated. I took a few pictures of the lions performing, but the crowds were pretty dense and I soon gave up and went home.

*Dragons and performers in Trafalgar Square*

*Stalls in Wardour St, Soho, sell paper dragons*

More pictures start here on My London Diary.

[As you can see I actually made quite a few pictures despite my comment in 2006, and when working in the crowded streets used a fisheye lens. This meant I could get really close to the people (and lions) I was photographing so there wasn’t room for people to easily walk between me and the subject. If I stood at all back, others simply got in front of me.]

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DLR – Bow Creek and Poplar Panoramas 1994

Bow Creek and Poplar Panoramas: It was before Christmas that I posted the previous set of panoramic images I made in July 1994 along the DLR between Poplar and Beckton, DLR – Connaught Rd & Bow Creek 1994. Here is the final set I made then.

*Bow Creek, Wharfside Rd, Canning Town, Tower Hamlets, Newham, 1994, 94-720-11*

Another picture taken from the East India Dock Road, looking down at Wharfside Road and the sawmills with their address on Barking Road. The road layouts here have changed with the building of Newham Way flyover and I think Barking Road which earlier began at the ‘Iron Bridge’ over Bow Creek now only starts at the roundabout about 250 yards or so to the east.

As the noticeboard states the entrance to the site is from Wharfside Road on the opposite side of the road, and any driver unfortunate to read the sign would be faced with a long detour to reach it.

M&J Reuben Ltd was founded in 1895 and seems to have moved from the area in 2004 when the then managing director David Reuben retired. London Sawmills Ltd also had timber sheds at Hercules Wharf in Orchard Place closer to the mouth of Bow Creek.

Bow Creek appears on both sides of this roughly 130 degree view, upstream at right, flowing under the bridges and in a long loop and coming up at the left past Pura Foods where London City Island now is, before turning round the other side of Pura foods to flow down to the Thames.

*Bow Creek, East India Dock Rd, Canning Town, Tower Hamlets, Newham, 1994, 94-720-12*

Moving a few yards to the west along East India Dock Road I made this picture standing on the bridge. The Iron Bridge, built in 1810, was the first road bridge to use cast-iron columns and made a new lower route across Bow Creek. It has now been replaced and the current bridge is concrete.

On the left of the river is Essex Wharf, with the sawmills out of picture to the left. The first bridge on the river, a pipe bridge for a large gas pipe, was demolished soon after, but its brick piers remain. The second bridge is now the ‘Blue Bridge’ though in my picture it is grey. A third, a disused single track rail bridge, is hidden by those in front.

*Construction work, South Bromley, Tower Hamlets, 1994, 94-721-62*

A little further on but I think still on or close to the East India Dock Road I made this picture looking across a construction site, the DLR, Bow Creek and Pura Foods. I think that the tunnel which connects East India Dock Road to Aspen Way is under the site here.

Aspen Way, East India DLR, South Bromley, Tower Hamlets, 1994, 94-720-51 — *Aspen Way, East India DLR,* South Bromley, Tower Hamlets, 1994, 94-720-51

East India Dock Station on Aspen Way, looking west. At left is the Telehouse South and the Blackwall Tunnel ventilation shafts. Then along the horizon some 1930s council flats and buildings aroudn Canary Wharf including the tower. On the other side of the DLR viaduct is the Grade II listed former hydraulic pumping station in Naval Row and over the dock wall the ugly 1990s buildings on the former East India Dock.

*DLR, Poplar, Tower Hamlets, 1994, 94-721-11*

Finally a view through the rear window of a DLR train on its way from Poplar to Canary Wharf. Poplar Station can just be seen under the long footbridge across the DLR and the Wes India Dock Road. At left is the DLR line towards Tower Gateway.

The next post in this series of my colour pictures will feature pictures made in July 1994 here and elsewhere using a normal camera.

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Slavery, Cruelty to Animals & Afrin – 2018

Slavery, Cruelty to Animals & Afrin: On Saturday 27th January 2018 I photographed a protest against the imprisonment, torture and slavery of African migrants in Libya and their slavery in Dubai, the continuing protests against animal cruelty outside the Canada Goose store and a march by Kurds calling for an end to attacks by Turkish forces on Afrin. That protest took the same route as last Saturday’s protest against the attacks on Kurds in Syria, now by the Syrian army.

End UAE Support For Slavery In Libya

UAE Embassy

Slavery, Cruelty to Animals & Afrin - 2018

The protest outside the UAE Embassy had not been well advertised and was rather smaller than the organisers had hoped or the police had planned for. The United Arab Emireates was targeted as they fund armed groups in Libya which imprison, torture and kill African migrants and sell them as slaves.

African migrants are also trafficked to be slaves in Dubai, the largest city and capital of the UAE and the protest called for an end to this and for help to be given for slavery victims in Dubai to return to their families in Africa.

End UAE support for slavery in Libya

Canada Goose Protests Continue

Regent St

Protesters continue their regular protests outside the Canada Goose flagship store in Regent St calling on shoppers to boycott the store because of the horrific cruelty involved in trapping dogs for fur and raising birds for the down used in the company’s clothing.

Their activities have been restricted by injunctions obtained by the store but they were still protesting every Saturday and on at least one other day each week.

They say ‘Canada Goose Murders Dogs’ . The clothing they sell uses fur from wild dogs caught in traps; caught in the traps and wounded by them, they slowly bleed to death and may be attacked and eaten by predators while still alive before the trappers return. Some of those caught gnaw through their own legs to escape and die slowly elsewhere.

Canada Goose protests continue

Defend Afrin, Stop Turkish Attack

BBC to Downing St

Several thousand, mainly Kurds took part in the march calling for an end to the attacks by Turkish forces on the Afrin Canton of Northern Syria, now a part of the Democratic Federation of Northern Syria (DFNS) or Rojava, a de-facto autonomous region in northern Syria since the 2011 revolution.

Many see Rojava and its democratic constitution which treats all ethnic groups – which include Arabs, Assyrians, Syrian Turkmen and Yazidis as well as Kurds – equally and liberates women as a model for the future of this and other multi-ethnic areas.

Turkey has long been engaged in a fight against the Kurds inside Turkey and was now attempting to eliminate those in areas close to its border with Syria. The PKK, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, a Kurdish nationalist organisation regarded by Turkey and its allies as a terrorist organisation, has been in armed conflict with Turkey since 1984, demanding equal rights and Kurdish autonomy in Turkey.

It was Kurdish forces, with the help of US air support that defeated ISIS in Syria, while Turkey was aiding ISIS in smuggling out the oil which financed their activities. But Turkey has the largest military forces in the area including weapons sold to them by the UK, France and USA as a member of NATO.

The PKK is a proscribed group in the UK and the police apparently seized a few PKK flags at the start of the march. It’s leader Abdullah Ocalan has been held largely in isolation in a Turkish jail since 1999, though in 2025 he called for the PKK to dissolve itself and announced an end to their insurgency against Turkey.

Many more pictures on My London Diary: Defend Afrin, stop Turkish Attack.

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The Gambia & No Fracking – 2015

The Gambia & No Fracking: Two protests on Monday 26th January 2015 were both taking place at lunchtime in Old Palace Yard opposite the Houses of Parliament. One was by Gambians against the brutal repression in The Gambia and the other a protest against government support for fracking.

Gambians protest brutal repression

Old Palace Yard

The Gambia is the smallest country in mainland Africa, a long strip around 10 miles on each bank of the Gambia River for around 200 miles inland from its Atlantic mouth, surrounded on land by Senegal. Originally colonised by the Portuguese traders it later became a part of the British Empire, while inland from the river was under French control. After the UK 1807 act to abolish the slave trade, ships from the Royal Navy brought slaves from ships they intercepted to settle on the river. The Gambia became independent in 1965.

A military coup in 1994 led to Lieutenant Yahya Jammeh becoming President, and under his dictatorship any opposition “faced exile, harassment, arbitrary imprisonment, murder, and forced disappearance.”

The protest in January 2015 took place after the arbitrary arrests, detentions, tortures and summary executions of those who took part in the 30th Dec uprising against dictator Yahya Jammeh – and their innocent family and friends.

Despite the severe repression in the country in the following year Jammeh lost the December 2016 presidential election; his reluctance to leave the post led to military intervention which resulted in the victor Adama Barrow assuming power.

Gambians protest brutal repression

No Fracking Anywhere!

Old Palace Yard

Hundreds of campaigners from across the country protested as MPs were due to vote on a proposal to ban fracking and also on a controversial proposal to allow fracking under people’s homes without permission in the Government’s Infrastructure Bill.

*Tina-Louise Rothery with a Frack Free Lancashire poster*

The protest was two days before Lancashire County Council were due to decide on whether to give the go ahead for Cuadrilla to frack in Lancashire which would set a precedent for the rest of the UK. Tina-Louise Rothery from Frack Free Lancashire was one of those who had come to speak at the protest.

There were many other speakers too, including Bianca Jagger, Vivienne Westwood and Caroline Lucas MP, Vanessa Vine, the Founder of Frack Free Sussex and BIFF! (Britain & Ireland Frack Free), John Ashton, the Former UK Government Special Representative for Climate Change, Hannah Martin of Reclaim the Power, Norman Baker MP amd Labour MP Joan Walley, chair of parliament’s Environmental Audit Committee which that morning had come out against fracking .

*Norman Baker, Bianca Jagger, Caroline Lucas and John Ashton with the ‘Frack-free Home’*

Greenpeace had come with their model ‘Frack-free Home’ and a petition with 361,736 signatures to Parliament.

*Puppet monster Mr Frackhead in front of Parliament*

Despite the widespread opposition t it took several more years of campaigning before the UK government finally announced a moratorium on fracking in November 2019.

More at No Fracking Anywhere!

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Kung Hei Fat Choi & Regicide – 2004

Kung Hei Fat Choi & Regicide: On 25th January 2004 I went with many thousands to celebrate the Chinese New Year in Trafalgar Square and Chinatown. In 2001 I had commented on My London Diary “there are too many people and too many photographers at the Chinese New Year celebrations in Soho, but somehow I keep on going” but for various reasons I think the next time I photographed it was in 2004. I was back again in 2005, 2006, 2007 and in 2008 for I think the last time.

Several things finally decided me to give the celebrations a miss. First was simply the crowds with more and more people coming to watch the event which made it difficult or impossible to move around and take pictures.

Then more and more people were photographing – mainly with their phones – and largely lacking any courtesy in doing so, coming to stand in front of me as I was trying to take pictures.

And, like many events, it had become more and more organised, with crowds being controlled and held behind barriers for the more official parts of the celebration.

But I suppose the main reasons were that my interests had changed and that I thought I had done enough on this event; my pictures each year were looking increasingly the same and I needed to do something different.

Also taking place on 25th January 2004 was a parade by reenactors of the execution of King Charles I. While I’m not a puritan (as I think many of my ancestors were) I am increasingly a Republican and while I might not be calling for the public execution of our current monarchy, I do think it is well past time we got rid of them and their privilege – as well as the rest of the aristocracy.

Of course it isn’t just the monarchy I would like to see go, but our whole class system of which they are the leading edge. Its real basis is the seizure of land following the Norman conquest in 1066 and my revolution would call for land reform, with the complete ending of private ownership of land (and water) which would become community resources, with no land ownership but instead could be held in trust to the community. But of course it’s a utopia which won’t happen.

Here’s the short text – with minor corrections – which I wrote in 2004.

The Chinese New Year was celebrated in Westminster on 25th Jan, with speeches in Trafalgar Square, fireworks in Leicester Square and immense crowding in and around Soho’s Chinatown, especially where the police sealed off some of the streets.

Fortunately the speeches were short, and the main point of most was to say ‘kung hei fat choi’, with various degrees of ethnic feel.

Also on the 25th, was a parade commemorating the execution of King Charles 1, who went from St James Palace to the Banqueting House in Whitehall to be beheaded on 30th Jan 1649. It’s an event that brings out the Republican in me!

It was a rather mournful procession, drab and silent, in complete contrast to the lively scenes a few yards to the north.

A few more pictures from the day on My London Diary begin here.

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