Suspend prosecutions related to Palestine Action, letter urges

Protesters arrested for supporting Palestine Action should not be prosecuted until a legal challenge to a ban on the group has been heard, organisations including Greenpeace and Human Rights Watch have told the attorney general for England and Wales.

- Haroon Siddique Peter Walker

In a letter to Richard Hermer KC, also signed by Friends of the Earth, Global Witness and the Quakers, they say proceeding with charges or trials before the judicial review, which is expected to be heard in November, would raise significant legal and moral questions.

Last weekend 522 people - half of whom were over 60 - were arrested under section 13 of the Terrorism Act at a demonstration in Parliament Square for carrying placards that stated: "I oppose genocide, I support Palestine Action." The detentions took the total number of people arrested under the act in relation to the banned group since it was proscribed last month to more than 700.

The letter says that the attorney general, rather than the Crown Prosecution Service, makes the decision on how cases should proceed under the Terrorism Act and urges him to act "in the public interest".