Defying lockdown, Londoners rally outside US embassy
Hundreds of Londoners defied coronavirus restrictions and rallied outside
the US embassy on Sunday in solidarity with protests raging across the United
States over the death of an unarmed black man during an arrest.
The death of George Floyd in Minnesota has sparked five consecutive nights of often violent protests that resulted in National Guard troops patrolling majority US cities on Sunday.
The London protesters chanted: "No justice, no peace" and "Enough is enough" as they marched towards the US embassy compound on the southern bank of the Thames River.
Shouting "Say his name! George Floyd!" they held up "Black Lives Matter" signs outside the embassy building.
Earlier, a few hundred had earlier gathered in Trafalgar Square in the heart of London for a vigil that saw everyone kneel for nine minutes -- the amount of time the policeman kneeled on Floyd's neck.
When you take someone's life, the way that happened, then it does something to you wherever you are in the world -- because it was totally wrong," one demonstrator, Trevor Joseph, told AFP.
"It's a worldwide thing. It happens in America and we have to show solidarity," he added.
READ: Clashes outside White House as US cities under curfew
"I'm here because I'm tired, I'm fed up with it. "When does this stop?" another protester, Doreen Pierre, told AFP.
"What makes that okay in anybody's mind? Don’t you have wives, don’t you have children watching you do this? How is that okay?"
A protest march also took place in the northern English city of Manchester, at which local media said hundreds took part.
UK Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab called footage of the incident "very distressing".
But he refrained from commenting on US President Donald Trump's explosive tweets and controversial public statements about the protests.
"I've long kept to the self-imposed guidance not to comment on what President Trump says," Raab told the BBC.
Authorities will officially allow groups of up to six to gather in England -- and up to eight in Scotland -- starting on Monday as more than two months of restrictions begin to ease.
