Trafalgar Square became Red Square this afternoon, as anti-arms trade campaigners filled its famous fountain with fake blood. They were protesting against DSEi - Europe's largest arms fair - which is currently taking place in East London.
The demonstrators unveiled a banner which read: "Arms dealers in town. Stop DSEi
In an anonymous press statement, the protestors - believed to be students - said:
"The DSEi arms fair is a stain on London, selling weapons of mass destruction to repressive regimes the world over.
"The government subsidises the arms trade to the tune of £763 million a year - money which could better be spent on education.
"On the anniversary of September 11 atrocities in New York and Chile, the best thing we could do to prevent terror is to stop this bloody trade. Disarm DSEi!"
Comments
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Amazed!
11.09.2003 15:57
Spitfire
Homepage: http://twotins.tripod.com
WELL DONE
11.09.2003 16:16
Tom Paine
e-mail: tompainee@yahoo.co.uk
ABSOLUTELY BEAUTIFUL
11.09.2003 22:54
Michael
nothing but childish acts of vandalisim
12.09.2003 08:32
paul
Good Stuff
12.09.2003 08:41
Couldn't believe the atmosphere on the streets last night outside the pigscum hotel where the pigscum death merchants were stuffing their faces. Great turnout, great solidarity, possibly the best demo in London for years! What was really amazing was the reaction from local people - everyone was waving and cheering from their balconies and even some of the motorists were sympathetic to what we were doing!
Keep up the good work!
EAT PROTEST!
SLEEP PROTEST!
SMOKE MARIJUANA!
Andy
Fountain-tastic!
12.09.2003 08:54
I couldn't come to the protests but have been following your every move on Indymedia and I think you all rock. Massive respect to the peaceful massive!
And Paul, "vandalism"? A teensy bit of red dye? Please...There are times and places for bold statements, and this was definitely one of them.
Princess Leia
Very visual and makes the point strongly - congratulations!
12.09.2003 15:15
We did this is Manchester on the day the Iraq war started. In Piccadilly Gardens, there are now some fountains that shoot up into the air periodically (rather like the ones in Paris near the Eiffel Tower). Red dye was put into these fountains and it had a similar effect.
We need to find ways to communicate visually and, even better, using as many of the senses as possible, to bring home to people the horror and pointless carnage of imperialist war. The thing is most young people in Britain today have never experienced the horror of full scale war like previous generations. War films never show the true horror of war--they can't really because it would a have such a traumatic effect on people.
But there are ways of giving people some sense of the horror. Dressing protestors up as "wounded" people with bandages and lots of ketchup and doing publicity stunts like die-ins, are good ways of making the point.
In Manchester we had a mock "funeral" for the war victims last March with people dresed in black, wearing creepy-looking white face masks, and carrying "coffins" through the streets of Manchester. The important thing is to VIDEO this sort of theatrical stunt so that they can be shown to a wider audience globally via sites like this. Invest in a video camcorder and record them fro a wider audience and also for posterity. For example, the above event in Trafalgar Square should have been videoed. If a pictrure is worth a thousand words, a video is worth million...
Chris Edwards
yay
12.09.2003 16:06
phoebe
Hey Paul
13.09.2003 10:00
the exposer
Best stunt in ages
14.09.2003 10:10
congrats
B
B
e-mail: circletheory@aol.com
You Twat
16.09.2003 16:34
electropixie
e-mail: djscreamy@hotmail.com
What about........
19.09.2003 15:31
cat