AFP, published on Saturday 01 July 2023 at 16:21.
A rainbow-colored crowd marched through London in a festive mood on Saturday to celebrate the LGBT+ community during the 51st Pride March, which was briefly interrupted by environmental campaigners.
The parade, featuring thousands of rainbow flags and fans, left Hyde Park for Whitehall in central London at midday. The organizers expected more than a million participants for this Pride March, one of the largest events in the world for the LGBT+ community.
The procession was stopped for a few minutes by environmental activists from the group Just Stop Oil. They blocked the Coca-Cola truck, calling it “the world’s worst plastic polluter.”
Just Stop Oil had previously asked the organizers to refrain from sponsorship by “highly polluting industries”. United Airlines is one of the largest sponsors of the Pride March.
“These partnerships embarrass the LGBTQ+ community at a time when much of the cultural world rejects ties to these toxic industries,” Just Stop Oil, a group that has carried out shocking actions primarily at sports competitions, said in a statement.
According to the police, seven demonstrators were arrested.
The procession was soon able to move forward again.
London Mayor Labor Sadiq Khan attended the Pride March and said it was “showing the world that the capital is a beacon of inclusion and diversity”.
But “the sad reality is that people around the world continue to be persecuted for who they are and that around the world we are seeing a concerted effort by some to undo hard-won gains,” the official-elect said Gay Times newspaper.
“No one should be discriminated against or live in fear of violence because of the person they love,” the Foreign Office tweeted on Saturday morning.
The London Pride March comes just over a month after Uganda passed what it says is one of the most repressive laws in the world. This text provides for severe penalties for people who engage in homosexual relationships and “promote” homosexuality.
The first London Pride March took place in 1972. Several hundred people attended this rally, organized just five years after homosexuality was decriminalized in the UK.