Report by Alison Mason photos from participants

I joined Marty, Clara and Guillermo at Sunday’s Black Lives Matter assembly at the US Embassy to show solidarity with the cause and to network support for Julian’s plight.
Overwhelmed by the vast numbers of people (I estimate roughly 10,000), I pondered how wonderful it would be if we could harness these sorts of numbers to stand up for the freedom of Julian Assange.

We picked up with the crowds later in Parliament Square and handed out leaflets and placed posters and laminates of Julian strategically among the hundreds of cardboard signs that marchers had left on display along the Westminster fences and the statues in Parliament Square. It was Marty’s brilliant idea to take copies of the We Are Millions poster featuring Alice Walker and Derek had some printed which we put on the statue of Lloyd George whose name protesters changed to Flloyd George, of course.

There were some familiar faces we chatted to but also engaged with general members of the BLM public and related how Julian had shone a light on the exploitation of people of colour all around the world exposing illegal wars, lies and corruption by governments and corporations. We handed out the great new flyer to people near Downing Street and Parliament Square and didn’t get any negative response.

It was definitely a useful outing and I think we will go back to any further BLM marches and see no reason why next time we can’t take a banner and hopefully have our own wing section in the march.

Report by Derek Jardine (download it here: BLM report 7 June)

More photos from the action: