Naming The Dead

Saturday 1450- 13th October 2012.

 Last Sunday I attended a very moving commemoration in London’s Trafalgar Square organised by the Stop the War Coalition.  and I want to tell you about it.

It was held on the 11th Anniversary of the start of the Afghanistan war and during the commemoration speeches were made and some of the dead, both Afghan civilians (estimated to be some 50,000) and British soldiers, were named along with when and where they died.

You can listen to some of the speeches here

It was very moving as some of the people who spoke, notably a mother and a grandmother, had lost sons or grandsons. The woman in the photo above is the very brave  Caroline Munday, she is the mother of James Munday, who was 21 when he died. He was a soldier in the Household Cavalry regiment killed in Helmund province in Afghanistan on the 15th October 2008.  She spoke emotionally not just about those killed but also about those who come home injured “broken in body and mentally”

The man pointing his finger comes from Afghanistan. Initially he was not allowed to speak because he wasn’t scheduled to but he insisted. He too spoke movingly about what is happening to his country. He also reminded those present that Osama Bin Laden had not been found in Afghanistan ( one of the reasons given for starting the war) but had in fact been found in Pakistan. He also stated that not only has Afghanistan been invaded by troops from the west but is constantly under attack from Pakistan.

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After the speeches a letter was brought to Downing Street and handed in asking that we don’t wait to withdraw troops in 2 years but we do it now and have the troops home by Christmas. Do these letters ever get read by the Prime Minister? ….. Sadly I somehow doubt it.

I’ll finish by showing you some of the faces of the British troops who have died in Afghanistan.

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Lets all demand peace at every opportunity and stop believing successive government propaganda that says we are fighting a war to reduce the threat of terrorism. 

You can read some other posts with a Peace tag here

Signing off now .. Don’t let me just wonder what you are thinking tell me below..

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You can find my photography blog Photomania here I hope you’ll pop over and take a look if you haven’t already.

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