Protests Begin against Bush Visit

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Protests Begin against Bush Visit

Another Success for Anti-War Movement

Unprecedented State Mobilisation for Bush Visit

Robin Cook Accuses Tony Blair in Justifying Bush Visit: "Dishonest, Shallow and Cheap"

Events to Welcome Bu$h

Guantanamo

Manifest Destiny

Lindis Percy, 61, from Yorkshire, unfurled a US flag upside down bearing the words "Elizabeth Windsor and Co. He's not welcome" on Monday after scaling the 20-foot-high gates of Buckingham Palace. She spent over two hours clinging to the gates before coming down and was arrested on charges of causing criminal damage and breach of the peace.

In the morning Vietnam war veteran Ron Kovic, along with other activists, had handed in a 100,000-name petition to Downing Street. Ron Kovic is wheelchair-bound after being paralysed in combat in Vietnam in 1968. The petition declared that Bush is not welcome and should not have been invited to Britain.

"What is happening in Iraq is a mirror image of the nightmare that happened in Vietnam. This is unacceptable and we will not stand for it," Ron Kovic said. He said that the war with Iraq is wrong and immoral and that the British and US governments’ policy destroys lives. Not only were US and British soldiers dying, but Iraqi people too. He demanded the immediate withdrawal of US and British troops from Iraq, and declared that the people of the US and Britain are going to stop the war, changing not only their own countries but the world too.

In the evening, Ron Kovic was present at a screening of the film "Born on the Fourth of July", which he helped to inspire.

Demonstrators against Bush’s visit have won the demand to march past parliament and up Whitehall on Thursday. The authorities had previously opposed such a route.

"I would consider it to be a triumph for democracy and the peace movement," Kate Hudson, chairwoman of CND told reporters, saying she expected 100,000 people to take part.

Islington MP Jeremy Corbyn emerged from Scotland Yard to tell reporters: "We will be marching across Westminster Bridge past Parliament, turning right into Whitehall and going past Downing Street to Trafalgar Square."

Lindsey German of Stop the War Coalition said: "This is a victory for democracy."

Bush’s carriage ride down the Mall with the Queen had previously been cancelled because of the opposition from the anti-war movement.

To beef up what it describes as an "unprecedented" security operation, the Metropolitan Police said it was nearly tripling the number of officers on duty during the course of Bush's visit from 5,000 to 14,000. This is practically half of all of Scotland Yard's police officers. "We've got to make sure that London is kept safe and the visit goes well," deputy assistant Metropolitan Police commissioner Andy Trotter said.

In addition there will be several hundred US Secret Service agents lurking on the streets. Bush's guardians have insisted on top-level security, ruling out traditional events such as a horse-drawn carriage ride with the Queen through the city. With Bush will be 750 US armed agents, 250 of whom will be permanently at his side throughout the three-day state visit.

The armed US agents accompanying Bush will be ready to shoot to kill, but the Home Office has said that if anyone is shot by US agents, the agents will not be protected by diplomatic immunity, as the US had demanded, but will be subject to the British legal system.

Police snipers will line the president's route on rooftops around Whitehall and Buckingham Palace and all the capital's rapid response armed units are on full alert. Tornado aircraft have been put on alert in Norfolk in case any aircraft makes an unauthorised entry into London air space.

Preparations which began overnight included the setting up of armed roadblocks around Whitehall and Buckingham Palace, screening tents manned by armed police with airport-type metal detecting and X-ray equipment on pavements, and increased security checks at airports and ports, including the Eurostar terminal at Waterloo.

Writing in The Independent on November 14, Robin Cook accused Tony Blair of making dishonest, shallow and cheap arguments to justify George W Bush’s state visit to Britain.

Robin Cook wrote: "I was Foreign Secretary at the time the Royal Visits Committee quietly dropped President Clinton from the forward programme of state visits because of his impending impeachment [over the Monica Lewinsky affair]. I am bewildered that the same committee that concluded Bill Clinton did not merit a state visit has decided that George Bush has the stronger claim to be so honoured."

Cook attacked Blair for attributing the huge protests to take place this week to "resurgent anti-Americanism". He says this is "a dishonest, shallow, cheap argument, not worthy of such a consummate communicator ... It is entirely possible to want warm relations with the American people while keeping a prudent distance from the foreign adventures of President Bush."

He continued: "The state visit is the latest episode in a relationship with the Bush administration that has remained so one-sided that it has become an affront to our national dignity."

Cook urged the Prime Minister to revive Britain's self-respect by standing up to President Bush's foreign policy, notably by internationalising the political process in Iraq through the United Nations. If Downing Street's relationship with the Bush White House is to survive, he said, it must evolve into a "two-way street".

Cook continued: "If the state visit takes on the character of the US boss visiting his wholly owned British subsidiary it will do further damage to relations with the Bush administration in the eyes of the British public and further diminish the stature of their Prime Minister."

He also writes that the first state visit by an American president since 1918 could harm the US Democrats in next year's Presidential election. "It is pretty perverse of us to make their task even tougher by offering up Buckingham Palace as the mother of all photo-ops for President Bush."

London

Tuesday November 18

6:00 pm: March to US Embassy the day Bush arrives in the UK: assemble Lincolns Inn Fields, Holborn tube. Route to include ExxonMobil ("Esso") offices, Aldwych, through central London to end at the US embassy. For more info see Campaign Against Climate Change (http://freethesheeple.net/cacc/html).

6:30 – 8:00 pm: "Bring Down Bush" Public Gathering. Windrush Square, Central Brixton (next to the library). With speakers, poets, music and the trial of George Bush in front of his "statue".

7:00 pm: Stop the War Coalition Rally at Friends Meeting House, Euston Road. Speakers to include Ron Kovic, George Galloway MP, Tony Benn, Harold Pinter, Caroline Lucas, Alice Mahon, Kate Hudson, John Rees. For more info see Stop the War Coalition

Wednesday November 19

11:00 am: Alternative State Procession Cavalcade with cyclists, taxi drivers, scooter clubs, etc., following open carriage. Meet 11am, Jubilee Gardens, South Bank, London.

11:00 am: School students rally. Parliament Square.

12:00 noon: Sambistas Street Party 12 noon, Malet St just outside the University of London Union. Bring costumes, agit-prop, bikes and fun, for a good old fashioned street party. campaigns@younggreens.org.uk

1:00 pm: O-I-L Women’s peace picnic. Top end of Trafalgar Sq.

1:00 pm: A Royal Welcome. Plays by Tony Kushner, Caryl Churchill and Martin Crimp. Royal Court Theatre, Sloane Square (Sloane Square tube). Admission free.

3:00 pm: Resist Bush Tea Party. Assemble Victoria Station for mass protest and civil disobedience (mass sit-down protest), Buckingham Palace. http://www.resistbush.org

4:30 pm: Picket outside Esso building, Aldwych.

6:30 pm: Stop Bush T-shirt Competition outside Buckingham Palace.

8:30 pm: Tell Me Lies… An evening of poetry, protest and song with Adrian Mitchell, Mark Steel, Mike Rosen, Saadi Yousef, Sarah Maguire, Janie Dee, and Tino Gonzalez and band. Camden Centre, Bidborough Street, Opposite St Pancras station (King’s Cross tube). Tickets £7/£5 concs: 020 7053 2153/4/5/6 or 07951 235 915.

Also.... throughout the day: demonstrations and open mass non-violent civil disobedience around London dependent upon the itinerary of George Bush.

Thursday November 20

1:00 pm: outside the Odeon, Marble Arch. From there a silent "Dharma-Yatra-style" walk to Buckingham Palace to sit and meditate. For more information: 07810 822786.

2:00 pm: National Stop the War Demonstration starts from University of London Union (ULU), Mallet Street. Nearest tubes: Goodge Street or Russell Square. Ends with Rally in Trafalgar Square where a statue of George Bush will be pulled down. Jointly organised by CND, STWC and MAB. For more details: CND 020 7700 2393

Friday November 21

11:00 am: Guantanamo Bay protest at the US Embassy, Grosvenor Square. Nearest tube: Bond Street

12:00 noon – 1:00 pm: LAAW (Legal Action Against the War) National Day of Action to launch investigation of war crimes by Tony Blair PM.

http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2003/11/280113.html

 

Outside London (amongst others)

WEDNESDAY 19 NOVEMBER

Cambridge Stop The War Coalition Cambridge: Protest rally at 6:00pm in the Market square in Cambridge. http://www.camswc.eu.org

Sheffield: Stop Bush! End the Occupations! Dinnertime protest against the visit of George Bush, Further protest planned for after work, student protests happening all day.12pm and 5pm at the Town Hall/Peace Gardens.  http://www.sheffieldagainstwar.org.uk/groups/).

 

THURSDAY 20 NOVEMBER

Newcastle Buddhists for Peace: Silent candlelight vigil at Grey’s Monument, 6 – 7 pm. Women In Black will also hold a silent vigil.

Mass walkout from schools, colleges and workplaces in London and elsewhere...

 

Peace and Progress invites you to a symposium entitled: Guantanamo: the damage the War on Terrorism is doing to human rights

This second Peace and Progress Symposium will take place from 2pm to 4:30pm on Sunday November 23rd at the Friends Meeting House, Euston Road, London (opposite Euston station)

Hundreds of prisoners of war, amongst them 9 British citizens, are detained by the US government at Guantanamo Bay in inhuman and degrading conditions. They are held there under threat of execution, without charge or access to the due process of law, in contravention of international law, in an experiment to test how far human rights can be violated without public censure.

The speakers will be:

a.. Azmat Begg - Father of detainee Moazzam Begg  b.. Louise Christian and Gareth Peirce - Solicitors representing the families of British detainees held at Guantanamo Bay  c.. Vanessa Redgrave  d.. Philippe Sands QC - Professor of International Law, UCL  e.. Mark Seddon - Editor of Tribune  f.. Rabinder Singh QC  g.. Burns Weston - Professor of International Law, Iowa University

We hope that you will be able to attend and take part in this important discussion. We also ask you to consider sponsoring the symposium: by adding your name to the list of sponsors, making a financial contribution, helping circulate this invitation or offering help on the day.

If you require further information about the symposium please contact Vivian Yates at vivian@peaceandprogress.org

Premiere concert performance of Manifest Destiny, Act 1.

Music: Keith Burstein

Words: Dic Edwards

A new opera set amongst Al Qaeda suicide bombers, Guantanamo Bay, the US Administration and a love story of a London Jewish composer, Daniel, and a Palestinian poet, Leila, who is drawn into terrorism.

Saturday November 22, 6.00pm (performance over by 7.00pm)

Cockpit Theatre, Gateforth Street, which is off Church Street near the Junction with Lisson Grove, Marylebone, London NW8 8EH. Nearest tube: Edgware Road, Reservations Answerphone 020 7258 2925.