Lambeth Bridge | >Re-PHOTO

Shaker Aamer, Raif Badawi & Climate Change – 2015

Shaker Aamer, Raif Badawi & Climate Change: On Wednesday 17 June 2015 the weekly ‘Stand with Shaker’ vigil outside Parliament was visited by two of the new intake of MPs. Outside Downing Street human rights organisations took part in a national day of action calling for the release of Saudi blogger Raif Badawi. A mass lobby on climate change brought around 250 MPs out of Parliament to meet voters who were urging them to persuade our government to take a leading role in the forthcoming Paris climate talks and after the lobby there was a large rally on Millbank.

New MPs Stand with Shaker

Parliament Square

Shaker Aamer, Raif Badawi & Climate Change - 2015

In 2015 the Free Shaker Aamer campaign was holding a lunchtime vigil on the pavement opposite Parliament every Wednesday when it was in session, calling for our government to urge the US authorities to release London resident Shaker Aamer still held in the illegal Guantanamo torture camp. Two newly elected MPs came to support the campaign.

Aamer was one of the original residents brought to the camp in 2002 after being sold to the US Army by bandits in Afghanistan where he was working for a Muslim charity,. He was first cleared for release in 2007.

He remained held there years later, probably because he would be able to give evidence about his torture at Bagram and Guantanamo which would embarrass both US and UK security services. He was finally released in September 2015.

New MPs Stand with Shaker

Support Saudi blogger Raif Badawi

Downing St

Human rights organisations including Index on Censorship, English Pen and the Peter Tatchell Foundation held a rally and handed in a letter to PM David Cameron calling on him to urge the Saudi government to release Saudi Blogger Raif Badawi.

Badawi was arrested in 2012 and convicted for founding a liberal web site which was alleged to be insluting Islam. Hia sentence was increased in 2013 to a 1 million riyals (£175,000) fine, ten-year in prison and 1000 lashes, a punishment he was unlikely to survive.

Badawi was flogged 50 times on 9 January 2015 and was due to be given another 50 lashes every Friday until the total was reached. But further floggings had been postponed so far as he had not recovered sufficiently.

Threats of flogging continued until at least 2016, but were delayed on health grounds sometimes only hours before they were to be carried out in what seems to have been a deliberate psychological torture. Finally he was released in 2022 but with a ban on travelling abroad until 2032. His wife and children fled the country and were granted political asylum in Canada in 2013.

Support Saudi blogger Raif Bad a wi

Climate Coalition Mass Lobby on Climate Change

Westminster & Lambeth

*Labour’s Rupa Huq, MP for Ealing Central and Acton in the centre of a large group from her constituency*

Thousands came to lobby their MPs, who met constituency groups either inside the Houses of Parliament or in a series of meetings spread out in Victoria Gardens, across Lambeth Bridge and on along the Albert Embankment.

*Some, like Tooting MP Sadiq Khan took advantage of the bicycle rickshaws to ferry them to the meetings*

I listened in briefly to a number of these meetings as I was walking around to take pictures. Most MPs seemed aware of the need for action, but too many were making excuses for not being able to take the kind of urgent action needed, and some seemed to me to have a have a patronising attitude that would certainly have lost them my vote.

The only heated argument I saw was with Neil Coyle, MP for Bermondsey and Old Southwark. After talking with him on climate change, the conversation moved on to housing, with Coyle defending the indefensible actions of the Labour local authority in emptying out their council estates and handing them over to be developed for private sale.

Climate Coalition Mass Lobby

Climate Coalition Rally

Millbank

*No to Austerity – Yes to a million climate jobs!’ is the message from the Trade Union Group of the Campaign against Climate Change*

After the lobby, the crowds moved on to Millbank for a rally, though many who had come from more distant parts of the country had instead begun their long journeys home. As well as filling Millbank, others sat on the grass in Victoria Gardens, where they could hear the many speakers, though not see them or the giant screen on which they and some short films were shown.

*Surfers Against Sewage stand with their boards*

With more than a hundred organisations taking part in the lobby, there were rather too many speakers for me, along with a number of celebrities, some of whom had very little of substance to contribute.

But there were others certainly worth listening to – and I name some and there are some photographs on My London Diary. But for me it was only the closing speech by Asad Rehman of Friends of the Earth which made a real attempt to tackle the political issues that are central to any effective action on climate.

Many more photographs on My London Diary at Climate Coalition Rally.

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Extinction Rebellion October Rebellion – 2019

Extinction Rebellion October Rebellion – London 7 Oct 2019

Five years ago today Extinction Rebellion began their day of October Rebellion in London by occupying eleven locations at government ministries, Downing St, The Mall, Westminster and Lambeth bridges, bringing traffic in the centre of London to a halt.

The action was billed as an International Rebellion and there were other actions taking place in New York, Sydney and possibly elsewhere and you can read much more about them on the XR web site.

XR demand the government tell the truth about the climate and ecological emergency, act to halt biodiversity loss, reduce emissions to net zero and create and be led by a Citizens Assembly.

I managed to get to some but not quite all of these 11 locations during the day and take pictures. Police hindered movement around the city to some extent, making me have to walk rather further than I wanted when they completely closed Lambeth Bridge to all pedestrians after XR had closed both ends to traffic.

Police made a few arrests here and there but it was hard to see any logic in their actions. Some people had locked themselves together but generally I think the police were simply overwhelmed by the large number of protesters.

As before XR’s ‘Red Brigade’ made a colourful splash and like most photographers I took too many pictures of them.

As a part of the protest two XR rebels Tamsin and Melissa were married on Westminster Bridge.

Everything was ready, the clergy had arrived, but only one of the two people being married – and she had gone to look for the other who was taking part in a protest at BEIS in Victoria St. So we had to wait – and the jazz band entertained us.

Eventually Tamsin comes and tells the band to stop playing as the couple are ready to start the wedding.

And the ceremony begins.

The couple kiss and make promises.

A young boy comes forward with a ring

Melissa gives Tamsin a ring and then Tamsin places a ring on Melissa’s finger

And they kiss again.

More pictures on My London Diary:
XR Rebels marry on Westminster Bridge
Extinction Rebellion occupy Westminster

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Human Chain Around Parliament – Free Assange!

Last Saturday, 8th October 2022, I photographed a protest in London against the imprisonment and possible extradition of Julian Assange, currrently held in the UK’s maximum security jail at Belmarsh.

Assange’s “crime” was to publish documents about US war crimes in Afghanistan, Iraq and elswhere, making documents downloaded by Chelsea Manning, making them available after suitable redaction to protect the individuals concerned to the world’s press and to the public on WikiLeaks. Wikipedia has a good and fairly detailed entry on him which most of the details here come from.

If extradited to the US he would be put on trial in a area where the jury would be composed of people from an area with strong connections to the US security services who will already have pre-judged him as guilty. His sentence is likely to amount to 175 years in a US maximum security jail, probably in isolation and never to be freed.

In 2010 Sweden issued an extradition warrant for him on allegations of sexual misconduct, which were widely seen as a pretext to enable him to be extradited from Sweden to face criminal charges in the USA. When in 2012 he lost his fight against extradition to Sweden he jumped bail to take refuge in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, where he lived in highly restricted accomodation until 2019.

A new government in Ecuador decided to end his asylum in the embassy and invited police in to arrest him in April 2019; he was then sentenced to 50 weeks in jail for breaching his bail. The Swedish sexual charges against him were dropped later in the year, but the USA immediately began proceedings to extradite him to face trial under the US 1917 Espionage Act.

The decision to use this Act has been widely criticised in the press and elsewhere as being an attack on the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, which guarantees press freedom. And if Assange is guilty then it seems clear that the editors of the newspapers that published the revelations he made in publising the Baghdad airstrike Collateral Murder video, the Afghanistan war logs, the Iraq war logs and other material could also be prosecuted. Even my publishing the link to the video could be a crime.

Assange’s sentence was completed in September 2019, but he was kept in jail because of the US extradition claim. He had been visited earlier by Nils Melzer, the United Nations special rapporteur on Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, who, as quoted on Wikipedia found “in addition to physical ailments, Mr Assange showed all symptoms typical for prolonged exposure to psychological torture, including extreme stress, chronic anxiety and intense psychological trauma.”

After a protracted hearing including much medical evidence, a judge on 4 January 2021 ruled that Assange could not be extradited to the USA on grounds of mental health and the suicide risk in a US prison cell. The USA appealed the decision, and Assange remained in jail. The High Court rejected much of the medical evidence, believed the US lies of fair treatment made and found in favour of the USA on 10 December 2021.

In April his extradition was formally approved in court and referred to Home Secretary Priti Patel, who approved it in June. But the legal battle continues with a new appeal. Essentially Assange has now been locked up for 10 years. Wikileaks has continued his work in releasing information in his absence. The continuing persecution by both the UK and USA for revealing their war crimes seems spiteful and malicious.

On Saturday 8th October I photographed a protest in London by around 10,000 people who formed a human chain calling for Assange to be freed and not to be extradited around the Houses of Parliament, crossing the river on Westminster Bridge and returning across Lambeth Bridge, a distance of a little over two kilometres.

It’s difficult to know how many took part, but there seemed to be enough people to join hands, with quite a few to spare in some parts where people were shoulder to shoulder and some to spare. The organisers had thought they would need around 5,000 so I think it was probably rather more than that; estimates I’ve seen range from 3,000 to 12,000. But as well as those present in person, many unable to get to Londonwere represented by yellow sashes with their names on them.

When I arrived people were tying these to the railings around the Houses of Parliament, but police came to remove them, handing them back to the protesters. They said nothing was allowed to be fixed to the railings. Many of the protesters held or wore the sashes for the protest, and although I don’t often take part in the protests I’m photographing, most of these pictures were taken by me with a sash reading ‘#Free Assange Monique Dits Belgium‘ around my neck.

At around 1.30, rather later than planned people were told to link hands and they chanted ‘Free Assange’ and other slogans for a few minutes. I’d chosen to be on Lambeth Bridge for this as I could then take photographs with the Houses of Parliament seen across the Thames in the backgound.

After taking some there I made my way along the rest of the chain back to Parliament, on my way passing John McDonnell being interviewed by a videographer. Normally I would have stopped to talk to him, but by now I was rather tired, still suffering a little from my booster jab the previous day and I carried on, past a small crowd of people with video and still cameras three or four deep around Jeremy Corbyn. But I’d decided he wasn’t really the story and carried on. I’ve photographed him enough times over the many years I’ve known him.

You can see more of the pictures I made in the album Human Chain Around Parliament Says Free Assange.