From West Midlands CND: Demonstration about US Spy drones at Fairford this Saturday and Statement about Police actions in Trafalgar Square last Saturday

There is more information about the demonstration here : – https://cnduk.org/events/us-spy-drones-out-of-fairford-demonstration/ .

I will be taking a car and leaving central Birmingham at about 10.45 am and returning at approximately 5pm.

Let me know if you would like to go.

Even if you are unable to go to the demonstration you might want to view the webinar on the Spy Drones here :- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PG-tCPIit24

You have probably read about the police arrests of demonstrators on Saturday at the Gaza demonstration.

CND, and the other groups who organised the demonstration, have put out a statement concerning this here :-https://cnduk.org/statement-on-the-events-of-saturday-18-january-at-whitehall-and-trafalgar-square/

As you can see this is a very different version of events from that of the police.

I was at the demonstration which , as far as I could see, was completely peaceful. The version of events in the statement accords with what I saw although I did not see the actual arrests. With many others in the crowd I walked towards Trafalgar square at the end of the rally (which I should point out is the way you go to get to Charing Cross tube station) and when I got to the end of Whitehall the police indicated I should walk through towards Trafalgar square.

The people were arrested (I think) on the other side of the square but by that time I was in a cafe trying to warm up as we had got very cold standing around at the static rally .

There had been some very moving speeches, including one from an 87 year old holocaust survivor who had been a 7 year old in Hungary when the Nazis invaded. He compared the events in Hungary with the death and destruction in Gaza, empathised with those under Israeli bombardment and asked why the slogan “Never Again” with regards to the holocaust had not been applied to the genocide in Gaza.

It is very concerning that the police appear to be trying to curtail our right to demonstrate.

Best Wishes

Gill Cox