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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Tuesday, November 18, 2003

Tens of thousands of Britons ready protest against Bush's visit

Tens of thousands of people across Britain are prepared to protest against US President George W. Bush's state visit starting Tuesday, bringing a possibly huge embarrassment for both the British and US governments.


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Tens of thousands of people across Britain are prepared to protest against US President George W. Bush's state visit starting Tuesday, bringing a possibly huge embarrassment for both the British and US governments.

A female protester believed in her fifties gave a two-hour prelude Monday by scaling the six-meter-high iron gate at Buckingham Palace and hung a US flag upside down from the top of the gate which has "Bush Not Welcome" written on it.

Bush is to stay at Buckingham Palace, the Queen Elizabeth II's official residence in central London, as the first ever US president paying state visit to Britain in recent decades.

One day ahead of his arrival, the Stop The War Coalition and American Vietnam veteran Ron Kovic presented a last-ditch petition which has been signed by more than 85,000 people to British Prime Minister Tony Blair's office at Downing Street.

"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," Kovic said when delivering the petition. His experiences are the basis of the anti-war film "Born on the Fourth of July."

There will be a series of anti-war protests throughout the country for each day of Bush's stay in Britain, which is to end Friday, the Stop The War Coalition has announced.

A number of anti-war groups from France, Italy, Germany, Russia and some other European countries also said they will travel to London for the protests.

However, the police have already refused the requirement from the protest organizers to march past parliament and Whitehall but allowed them to march in other parts of London, citing security reasons.

Charles Kennedy, leader of Britain's second largest opposition Liberal Democratic Party, urged protesters Monday to "use the opportunity to leave the president in no doubt as to the extent of public concern... about the way in which events tragically have unfolded."

It is reported that at the time when Bush arrives in Heathrow airport Tuesday evening, climate change protesters are due to march to the US Embassy and hold a rally there.

On Wednesday, school students will gather at Parliament Square in central London after hundreds of protesters riding bicycles stage their protest throughout main streets of the British capital.

Meanwhile, a so-called Resist Bush Tea Party will stage sit-down protest nearby Buckingham Palace and mass protests are to take place in Manchester, the northwestern port city of England and outside the US Consulate in Scottish capital Edinburgh.

The demonstrations will culminate in a "Stop Bush" mass march in central London on Thursday with between 100,000 to 200,000 people all over Britain expected to take part in. A mock statue of Bush will be toppled in Trafalgar Square at the time.

"Cyber protesters" are also planning to stage mass email protests to the website of US Embassy based in London on Thursday morning.

Bush is set to bid official farewell from Queen on Friday morning and then take a flight with British Prime Minister Tony Blair to Blair's Sedgefield constituency where hundreds of protesters are already awaiting for showing their rage against their stance in Iraq.

Protests against detention of eight Britons at Guantanamo Bay following the Afghanistan war are also expected to occur outside the US Embassy in London on Friday.

Scotland Yard has already warned that the series of planned protests will complicate the security situation, announcing Monday that the number of police on duty during Bush's visit has been increased to around 14,000 from originally claimed 5,000.

But Bush himself has shrugged off the demonstrations, saying campaigners are "lucky" to be free to protest and he understands why people oppose war.

"I understand particularly when I go and hug the moms and dads and brothers and sisters and sons and daughters of those who died," he said in an interview with The Sun newspaper Monday.

The American president is an unpopular figure in Britain, with a popular survey for The Times showing that only one in four voters approves of his handling of the Iraq war.

Moreover, half of those surveyed believe that Blair's close alliance with Bush has been bad for Britain.

Bush's visit this week threatens to be more of a test than a celebration of Britain's special relationship with America as the protests are poised to make the stay "a public relations disaster for Mr Blair and Mr Bush," local media commented.




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