On Tuesday thirteenth September 2011, protesters towards the worlds largest arms honest being held on the Exel Centre in East London introduced their protests to a few of the corporations promoting arms and to key websites together with Parliament Sq. and th Nationwide Gallery which was internet hosting a dinner for the arms merchants and their clients, together with representatives of lots of the most repressive regimes world wide.
Arms Truthful Protest At Parliament, Previous Palace Yard, Westminster
Round 250 folks got here to protest towards the DSEI arms honest which was opening that day in East London. Many have been individuals who had been protesting on the web site of the honest throughout the earlier week. The honest is the biggest on this planet, a non-public occasion supported by the UK authorities, and regardless of authorities denials, many offers are made there for unlawful arms and arms are bought to a few of the worlds most repressive regimes who use them towards their very own civilians.
Many had include posters and placards, however organisers CAAT (Marketing campaign Towards Arms Commerce) got here with faux arms to arrange a grocery store the place folks may queue to purchase riot fuel, guided missiles, ammunition and different essentiaql provides to maintain their inhabitants down.
Folks held up letters spelling out ‘THIS IS NOT OK’ after which different posters and banners.
There have been some songs, and anti-drone protesters staged a die-in as targets.
The nation’s solely Inexperienced MP (and probably the most smart within the Home of Commons) got here to talk.
Dr Zig’s ‘Bubbles Not Bombs’ -Thames Embankment, Tate Fashionable.
These exceptional bubbers from Dr Zigs in Wales and made their “critically HUGE bubbles” on the riverside stroll exterior Tate Fashionable, shouting “Bubbles not Bombs” as a child-friendly protest towards the DSEi Arms Truthful.
They are saying the DSEI honest is “the place dangerous folks the world over can come and purchase the newest in weapons, drones, warships and so on.” and name for it to cease.
Dr Zig’s ‘Bubbles Not Bombs’ Protest
Secret Gardens of St John’s Wooden
I simply had time between protests to pop as much as St John’s Wooden and the Queens’s Terrace Café, the place my present ‘Secret Gardens of St John’s Wooden’ had been hung on the weekend after I had been too busy to be there. Jiro Osuga who had completed the design and ornament and proprietor Mireille Galinou whose thought it had been had completed an important job and it was prepared for the opening.
Secret Gardens of St John’s Wooden
Down the Drones Arms Truthful Protest – Tower 42, Previous Broad St
Normal Atomics ,makers of Predator and Reaper drones had their London workplace in Tower 42, nonetheless higher recognized to many people because the Nat West Tower, on Previous Broad St Though there are broad areas of empty pavement most is land owned by Tower 42 and Metropolis police harassed protesters by guaranteeing they hold to the small space of public freeway after which clearing them from most of it as they have been then inflicting an obstruction.
There appeared to me to be no good cause why the police shold implement the civil property rights of the property proprietor which might not be harmed by a small incursion, nor harass the protesters on the general public freeway when others may simply stroll by – as many at all times do – on the personal land.
The protesters managed to chalk slogans and physique outlines on the pavement, displayed banners, sang and handed out leaflets to passers by concerning the risks of militarism however weren’t allowed to lie down on their goal and invite passers by to ‘zap’ them with a Ps controller of their sport of ‘Distant Management Killer Robots’.
The US was then utilizing round 48 Predator and Reaper drones in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the UK round 10 MQ-9 Reapers in Afghanistan, all managed by pilots in an airforce base in Nevada. Varied paperwork launched by whistleblowers present that drone strike typically happen on the premise of very restricted and infrequently unreliable proof typically killing harmless victims and any males in these international locations who look like of navy age and more likely to be targets.
Utilizing drones turns warfare for these ‘piloting’ them from a centre maybe a number of hundreds of miles from the battlefield into one thing very very similar to a pc sport, eradicating any regular human inhibitions concerning the indiscriminate killing of others.
Within the remaining jiffy police allowed three protesters to lie down on the pavement for just a few seconds to allow photographers to take photos.
Down the Drones Metropolis Arms Truthful Protest
DSEi Protest at BAE Methods
I’m unsure if there have been any police for the protest exterior BAE Methods in Carlton Home Terrace which was the ultimate marketed protest of the day. Maybe the police have been performing on recommendation from one in every of their plain garments operatives who had advised them there could be no hassle at this occasion.
BAE Methods is Britain’s largest manufacturing corporations, fashioned in 1999 by the merger of British Aerospace with elements of Marconi Electronics and traces its historical past again to 1560 and the Royal Gunpowder Mills at Waltham Abbey, through the years having included lots of the well-known names in UK trade, specific these concerned in aviation and arms manufacture. It additionally has a US subsidiary, BAE Methods, Inc. The corporate was a nationalised trade from 1977 to 1981, with the UK authorities in 1985 promoting its remaining shares aside from one very particular £1 share which it could actually use to forestall it changing into foreign-owned.
The corporate has been concerned in a variety of commerce scandals, significantly over its offers with Saudi Arabia. Most just lately in 2006 the Severe Fraud Workplace was compelled by the Labour authorities to drop enquiries into bribery over an arms deal by BAE Methods with Saudi Arabia after a Saudi royal prince threatened cancellation of the order in 2006. The Marketing campaign Towards Arms Commerce (CAAT) obtained a Excessive Court docket determination that this authorities motion breached the OECD Anti-Bribery Conference, however the authorities appealed and the legislation lords determined that nationwide safety needs to be an overriding precept and overturned the choice. So bribery, as effectively presumably as every other crime, is OK when it’s within the nationwide safety curiosity.
The federal government’s determination to cancel the investigation was seen by most as an admission of BAE’s guilt within the matter, and so they have additionally been below investigation for bribery in Chile, Romania, South Africa, Tanzania, the Czech Republic and Qatar and probably elsewhere.
BAE techniques are one of many world’s largest arms corporations, producing fighter plane, warships, missiles and tanks together with different weapons. They’re additionally one of many corporations that may revenue vastly from the substitute of Trident nuclear missiles, a high-spending and doubtlessly harmful challenge with no navy significance.
After some quick speeches about BAE, nearly all of these current laid flat on the pavement for a die-in earlier than getting up and leaving. Though this was the final marketed protest for the day, a message dangerous been handed round that there could be an motion on the Nationwide Gallery, which was internet hosting a dinner for these attending the DSEi arms honest.
Arms Truthful Fracas At Nationwide Gallery
After a day of peaceable demonstrations towards the DSEi Arms Truthful in London, a fracas developed as police tried to clear the Nationwide Gallery steps whereas a peaceable protest continued beneath within the North Terrace of Trafalgar Sq.. Effectively over 100 protesters had come to the Nationwide Gallery because it was closing to protest at a dinner being given there for these attending the DSEi arms honest, together with representatives of lots of the most repressive regimes world wide.
The protesters tried to enter the Gallery because it was closing however have been ushered out by safety workers, after which started a peaceable protest on the steps of the gallery. Gallery workers requested protesters to go away the steps however some determined to remain and show banners there, whereas others continued to protest peacefully on the North Terrace in entrance of the gallery, displaying banners and holding a ‘die-in.
Ultimately police received most of them transferring slowly down the steps, although just a few have been nonetheless refusing to maneuver. There was numerous joking between a few of the police and protesters and the ambiance was typically pleasant, though the protesters weren’t being very cooperative. All of the sudden one of many protesters was seized and roughly carried away by police in the direction of a close-by van. He didn’t look like formally arrested, and police would give no cause for his detention both to press, authorized observers or protesters.
This modified the temper utterly. Police reinforcements arrived and have been capable of pressure the protesters from the steps. There have been just a few incidents of what appeared thuggish violence in the direction of each women and men. Some have been arrested and dragged off to ready vans; it was arduous to make sure however their offence appeared to have been arguing and making an attempt to guard themselves towards police violence.
In the meantime the protest continued peacefully on the North Terrace with a die-in and audio system explaining to the group that had gathered that the protest was calling for an finish to UK arms gross sales to authoritarian regimes together with Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, each liable for the ruthless suppression of individuals within the ‘Arab Spring’ in addition to international locations concerned in main armed conflicts and human rights abuses. I believe many have been shocked to study that the UK was taking part in such a significant half on this killing of individuals world wide – not one thing our media typically dwell on.
Arms Truthful Fracas At Nationwide Gallery
Tags: Afghanistan, arms sellers, Arms honest, arms gross sales, arms grocery store, Bruce Kent, bubbles not bombs, child-friendly protest, Doct Zig, Down the Drones, drones, DSEI, DSEI Arms Truthful, Iraq, Jiro Osuga, London, Mireille Galinou, parliament, peter Marshall, police, Predator, protest, Reaper, secret gardens, Tower 42
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