Iraq cruelties 'make troops cry'

The soldiers visit him late at night, when the noise of gunfire and the sound of screaming is loudest.

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"They come to me after they've been to Iraq and they can't sleep and they start crying," Brian Haw told Gulf News.

"What we're doing in that country is worse than anything Hitler ever did.

"I'm not saying that lightly. You check out depleted uranium. We poisoned the cradle of civilisation, you know."

Haw has been holding a peace vigil outside the Houses of Parliament in London since June 2001. He stays there day and night, surrounded by placards demanding an end to the occupation of Iraq.

It is a demonstration that has angered the Government but touched many members of the public, including men who have fought on the streets of Basra.

"They're only kids. I'm not condemning them, they're only kids," said Haw. The 56-year-old began his vigil after learning about the way Iraq was being devastated long before the 2003 invasion by United Nations sanctions and allied bombing raids.

It started as the relatively small protest of just one compassionate man, but has since become a symbol for people from across the world who are angry at British and American foreign policy.

Tourists visiting Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament take photos of Haw, pose in front of his banners and read the information on the Iraq war that is pasted all around him. Many of them are shocked to find such an explicit voice of dissent outside the very place where Tony Blair works.

"I'm a father. I see what's being done to other people's children and it's so cruel. We've been torturing these poor beggars for years. Bombing Johnny Foreigner, bombing Mrs Johnny Foreigner, bombing Infant Johnny Foreigner we've been doing it forever," said Haw."

Who hasn't been to hear me on this pavement while I've been here? Who hasn't been here? Everybody's been here."

Haw told Gulf News he has seven children and was unemployed when he started the vigil. His face has changed a lot since then, becoming weatherbeaten and marked with time.

But he remains defiant and has fought off a number of government attempts to remove him. He is even running as an independent candidate in this week's election and it is quite clear he has no respect for the leaders of the three main political parties.