Carol singers raising money for a cancer charity in Trafalgar Square were attacked by protesters during a night of disorder that saw 139 arrests.
[Note: This article was originally posted on December 14th, 2011. The IFNM website was attacked by hackers and many articles are now gone from the archives. As a public service, IFNM is now reposting said articles.]
A demonstrator is arrested during the protests
Shops were attacked, passers-by threatened and car windows smashed during a demonstration in central London against the election result in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
The carol concert was raising money for MacMillan Cancer Support. It was organised by a group of friends whose loved ones had been treated for cancer.
Masked teenage boys ‘stormed’ the singers, throwing bottles of water and hot drinks into the crowd. A woman in her 40s, said to be undergoing treatment for breast cancer, was pulled to the ground. A youth attempted to set light to the Christmas tree, an annual gift from the city of Oslo since 1947, one witness said.
“They were determined not to let us sing and have fun and utterly ruined the atmosphere. Have your protest and make your point, but why did you have to ruin a lovely occasion with your scuminess,” Mark Horton, a conductor of the choir, wrote in a message online. The concert was cut short amid safety concerns.
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