The protesters blockaded Downing Street on 7 October Photo: London Catholic Worker
83 year-old Quaker protester faces court
John Lynes expects to be charged with criminal damage after a protest at Downing Street
A Quaker great-grandfather is facing court this week following a peaceful protest against the war in Afghanistan. John Lynes, 83, of St Leonards on Sea Meeting, was arrested at the gates of Downing Street on 7 October. In the dock alongside him are: a former SAS soldier, Ben Griffin, a Roman Catholic priest, Martin Newell, and a local activist, Maya Evans. They were all expecting to be charged with criminal damage at West End Magistrates’ Court.
They were part of a group of six who marked the tenth anniversary of the beginning of the Afghan war by daubing red paint on the gates to Downing Street. They say that the paint symbolised ‘the blood of the 25,000 civilians and 2,500 soldiers who have been killed or wounded in the last decade’.
They urged an end to the war and called for the release of British naval medic Michael Lyons, imprisoned for ‘wilful disobedience’ after he changed his views on the war in Afghanistan and refused to use a rifle (see ‘Michael Lyons loses appeal’, the Friend, 21 October). They also demanded freedom for Bradley Manning, in prison in the US for passing information to Wikileaks. The protest was organised by the London Catholic Worker, an anarchist Christian group.
‘Day after day this war costs lives,’ said John Lynes, ‘The lives of allied troops, of Afghans and now of Pakistanis’.
He added, ‘The war also costs resources which could be used to feed the starving, to heal the sick, to house the homeless, to build schools and to provide worthwhile livelihoods for our jobless youngsters’.
John Lynes is a veteran of nonviolent activism. He has travelled to Palestine several times with Christian Peacemaker Teams and was arrested by the Israeli authorities this summer (see ‘British Quaker arrested by Israeli authorities’, the Friend, 15 July).
Maya Evans insisted that the government’s justifications for the war are not believable. In a statement released at the time of the protest, the six participants insisted that ‘war cannot bring peace, nor armed violence solve political problems’.
