PEACE activists held an Alternative Remembrance Sunday ceremony yesterday afternoon in Tavistock Square, a short walk from the official central London ceremony.

A wreath of white poppies was laid on the conscientious objectors’ memorial stone to remember all the people harmed or killed in war, including conscientious objectors and other civilians, as well as members of the armed forces.

A total of 100 people attended the Peace Pledge Union (PPU) event,  including former members of the British armed forces.

Speakers included Chloe Skinner, who recently worked with Christian Peacemaker Teams to support human rights and nonviolence in Hebron, Palestine.

She remembered Hadeel Hashlamoon, an 18-year-old Palestinian woman shot by Israeli troops in 2015, and said she mourned the “collective complicity in militarised violence.”

PPU’s Peter Glasgow recalled the women who established the white poppy in 1933 after losing loved ones in the first world war, calling it “the true voice of remembrance,” which does not involve “the trappings of militarism.”