About 3,000 men, women and children staged a peaceful demonstration outside the British parliament on Monday against alleged human rights Protests in London against alleged human rights abuses in Sri Lanka.
About 3,000 men, women and children staged a peaceful demonstration outside the British parliament on Monday against alleged human rights Protests in London against alleged human rights abuses in Sri Lanka.Carrying banners reading "Stop Sri Lanka's Genocide of Tamils" and "Rwandan Genocide Repeats in Sri Lanka", the protesters waved flags of the Tamil Tiger rebels who face a threatened final assault by government forces.
A police spokesman estimated the turnout at about 3,000 at its height, and about 1,000 people continued protesting into the early hours of Tuesday.
The demonstration, although effectively illegal because it had not received prior approval, was peaceful and no arrests were made, the spokesman said.
Four lifeboats were scrambled after some of the protesters reportedly threatened to throw themselves into the nearby River Thames. One person did enter the water and was taken to hospital, but was not believed to be hurt.
A British lawmaker, Siobhain McDonagh, had earlier urged the crowd to disperse, saying the government's special envoy to Sri Lanka, Des Browne, would meet with 50 of their representatives to listen to their concerns.
Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse on Sunday said the military was close to wiping out the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) after decades of bitter fighting for an independent homeland. Rajapakse has rejected international calls for a truce which the government has argued would only let the rebels regroup.
The United Nations and other foreign aid organisations say as many as 150,000 civilians may still be trapped in the war zone, although the Sri Lankan government insists the figure is less than half that.
At the height of their power in the mid-1990s, the Tigers controlled more than a third of Sri Lanka.
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