Police arrest 38 in London anti-war demonstration

Police said they arrested 38 people overnight (NZ time) at what they said was an illegal anti-war demonstration outside parliament.

Scores of yellow-jacketed officers were posted around parliament after a website carried a call for demonstrators to prevent legislators from getting inside the building on their first day back after their summer break.

"Over the past few years the UK parliament and government have led this country into war upon war, torn up age-old rights and made the division between rich and poor grow ever wider," the website said, accusing parliament of complicity in the "continued destruction of Iraq and Afghanistan".

But only about 100 demonstrators gathered in Parliament Square, which faces parliament.

Police handed out leaflets to potential demonstrators warning them that police had not authorised the demonstration and that participating in it would be an offence under the Serious and Organised Crime and Police Act.

Police surrounded the demonstrators and a senior police officer then announced over a loudspeaker: "You are detained as I believe your continued presence in this area without being detained would lead to an imminent breach of the peace."

Curious tourists came to snap photographs of the standoff which continued for well over an hour.

A police spokesman said later that 38 demonstrators had been arrested.

Most were held for allegedly breaking the Serious and Organised Crime act or a breach of the peace, he said. One was arrested for possession of a controlled substance and another for possessing an offensive weapon, he said.

- REUTERS