Thursday 24 October 2024, the Free Political Prisoners exhibition occupied Petty France, the road outside the Ministry of Justice, blocking the road in both directions, calling for an end to the role of oil and arms industry lobbyists in silencing and jailing those who take action to hold those industries to account.

The occupation took place without arrests, in what was hailed by campaigners as a reclamation of democratic freedoms.

Trudi Warner a spokesperson for Defend Our Juries, one of the groups behind the campaign, said:

“Today, United Nations Day, people have come together in their hundreds to face down the repression and reclaim the path to authentic democracy.

Over the last couple of years, the rapid loss of democratic freedoms in Britain has been shocking. People have been jailed just for using the words ‘climate change’ and ‘fuel poverty’ in court. Others have been jailed for years for peaceful protest. Journalists have been raided under the Terrorism Act for reporting on the genocide in Gaza.

The absence of arrests today was not down to any softening of the stance of the police under the Labour government. It was purely down to the weight of our numbers.

In a functioning democracy, whistleblowers against oil and arms companies would not be silenced and jailed by lobbyists from those same industries. We will escalate our actions until we put a stop to this corruption of democracy and the rule of law.”

The view of yesterday’s Free Political Prisoners exhibition from within the Ministry of Justice (as they debate what to do about Britain’s prison crisis)

Hundreds of people took part in the action which blocked the road to traffic in both directions for 90 minutes. The action was carefully designed to be a lawful expression of democratic rights, in accordance with the Supreme Court judgement in Ziegler and others. In recent times however, people have been arrested for far less, so all those participating were prepared to be unlawfully arrested.

The exhibition, directly outside Hermer’s office in the MoJ, was a carbon copy of that which took place in the cul-de-sac outside Southwark Crown Court on 27th September, in which 320 people took part. Protesters held up images of political prisoners, past and present, to the windows of his office, defying him to turn a blind eye. They called for an end to the role of oil and arms industry lobbyists, such as Lord Walney and Policy Exchange, in silencing and jailing their political opponents.

https://youtu.be/XI390ye1JHM?si=v8VT7KXVKg2uAaM4

The action, falling fittingly upon United Nations Day, intensifies the pressure upon the Attorney General to bring the UK back into compliance with international law, as called for by the United Nations. It comes amidst intense scrutiny of his role in securing a police escort for Taylor Swift, which grotesquely overshadowed the revelations concerning the office of his predecessor meeting secretly with Israel’s largest arms company. Protesters called upon him to live up to the words of his recent Bingham Lecture, in which he stressed the vital importance of the rule of law generally and international law in particular.

Since the publication of Lord Walney’s report in May, calling for members of groups such as Just Stop Oil and Palestine Action to be treated as organised crime groups, more than 50 members of those groups have been jailed, some for as long as four or five years, following trials in which they have been banned from explaining to the jury why they have done what they have done. In the midst of Britain’s prisons crisis.

The Free Political Prisoners campaign has written to the Attorney General calling for a meeting to discuss this interference in the criminal justice process by industry lobbyists, which the Attorney General has refusedin a letter dated 4 October. Defend Our Juries has received no reply to a letter clarifying an apparent confusion on the Attorney General’s part concerning the proposed scope of the meeting.

VIRTUAL EXHIBITION