Church leaders move to defuse St Paul's Cathedral protest

By Anna Tomforde Nov 1, 2011, 17:37 GMT

London - After days of rising tension, the leaders of London's St Paul's Cathedral moved Tuesday to defuse the increasingly acrimonious atmosphere around a protest camp on its doorstep by inviting demonstrators in for a dialogue.

A cathedral spokesman said the church intended to 'engage directly and constructively' with the protestors who have set up some 150 tents around St Paul's, one of London's most famous landmarks.

Earlier, the church made clear that it would not back any moves to clear the demonstrators. It had suspended planned legal action to evict the group and was 'committed to a peaceful resolution at all costs,' a spokesman said.

Meanwhile, the City of London Corporation, which is responsible for law and order in the district in which St Paul's is situated, was expected to press ahead with attempts to seek an injunction with a view to possible eviction.

Since the camp was set up as part of worldwide protests to support the Occupy Wall Street movement in New York in mid-October, both the dean and the chancellor of St Paul's have resigned over the handling of the protest.

After initially being invited in by the church, the protestors, who number several hundred, have vowed to stay put despite appeals for them to move on.

But Richard Chartres, the Bishop of London, who took over the running of St Paul's on a temporary basis, invited the demonstrators to 'move from protest to serious debate.'

As the church shared many of the concerns raised by the protestors, such as banking bonuses, the financial crisis and environmental issues, should be jointly discussed.

'The alarm bells are ringing all over the world. St Paul's has now heard that call,' said the bishop.

'Today's decision means that the doors are most emphatically open to engage with matters concerning not only those encamped around the cathedral but millions of others in this country and around the globe.'

The cathedral said it had asked an investment banker, Ken Costa, to head a group looking to reconnect 'the financial with the ethical.'

Costa, the former chairman of Swiss bank UBS Europe, would work with the church, financial experts and public figures to engage in a dialogue with the protestors.

A spokesman for the Occupy London group, Sam Chase, described the development as 'wonderful news.'

Shami Chakrabarti, director of human rights group Liberty, said: 'Peaceful dissent is often inconvenient and uncomfortable. The test for St Paul's was not to rise above it all with the patience of a saint but to reflect and debate and listen.'

The cathedral's decision to opt for dialogue 'spoke volumes' for the aspirations of London and its most famous cathedral, she added.