They will never be forgotten

NCP delegation honours the fallen

by New Worker correspondent

A New Communist Party delegation paid tribute to the sacrifice of millions of working people to defeat fascism during the Second World War at the annual remembrance day ceremony at the Soviet War Memorial in Southwark on Sunday.

NCP leader Andy Brooks along with national chair Alex Kempshall and Dermot Hudson from the Metropolitan Cell joined diplomats, trade unionists and local dignitaries at the Soviet War Memorial in Geraldine Mary Harmsworth Park to honour the 27 million Soviet citizens who died in the Great Patriotic War against Nazi Germany.

There were brief speeches from Philip Matthews, the chair of the Soviet Memorial Trust Fund and Southwark mayor Charlie Smith before the wreath laying at the monument in the shadow of the Imperial War Museum began. Wreaths were laid by Neil Coyle the local Labour MP as well as Simon Hughes, the former MP who now leads the Southwark Liberal Democrats, along with diplomats from the Russian and Belarus embassies. Other floral tributes were laid by representatives of the NCP, the Marx Memorial Library, the Soviet Front Red Army re-enactors group and representatives from the Russian community in London.

The ceremony ended, as usual, with the exhortation spoken by Russian Convoy Club veteran Stanley Ballard, followed by two minutes silence and the reveille.