Arrested aged 75 under the Terrorism Act... how surreal

It was certainly not part of any life plan for my seventies that I should be facing a charge under the 2000 Terrorism Act. However, as one of the 532 arrested in Parliament Square on Saturday, under Section 13 of the act, that is where I am. And it still seems vaguely surreal.

- By JONATHON PORRITT

Section 13 relates to any public display indicating “that one is a member or supporter of a proscribed organisation” - in this case, Palestine Action.

Our alleged crime is that we were directly supporting Palestine Action by holding up a sign calling for an end to the genocide in Gaza and the reversal of home secretary Yvette Cooper's dangerous decision to proscribe it as a terrorist organisation.

So I sat there, mostly in silence, for two and a half hours before being arrested. I spent a lot of time looking around at all those holding identical signs (“I oppose genocide: I support Palestine Action”), and on one occasion burst out laughing at the absurd idea that these calm, predominantly old or middle-aged, middle-class citizens are now seen by our government as linked to or even the equivalent of members of al-Qaeda, the IRA, Boko Haram or the Wagner Group.