HUNDREDS of activists and Cop26 delegates gathered in Glasgow today to demand justice for migrants as the climate summit neared its end.

Campaigners met on Kenmure Street in the city’s Pollokshields  district almost six months to the day after residents of the area frustrated a Home Office attempt to remove two refugees from their homes and detain them. 

The march, which ended at the Home Office building in the city, saw international activists demand better treatment for refugees and the withdrawal of the Nationality and Borders Bill that is currently going through Parliament. 

Yvonne Blake, the daughter of a Windrush migrant and organiser with Migrants Organising for Rights and Empowerment (More),  said that people from all corners of the world had come to stand together against the Tories’ hostile environment for migrants in a city that was built on the profits of colonialism. 

She said: “The UK’s racist immigration system for some reason has the hostile environment to ensure the place is so hostile that people fleeing persecution would rather stay there, where women face gender-based violence, where boys are forced into toy armies and we are bombed. 

“That gives the Home Office and police, even those in our community, the right to treat us in the most inhuman fashion possible. 

“Glasgow is built on the back, [on the] blood and tears of my people. When we stand on this street to protest, we will not be intimidated.

“My blood, sweat and tears built this street. I am entitled to stand here. The blood, the lives of my people.”

More, Glasgow’s No Evictions and the Unity Centre organised the protest, which featured speeches by Cop26 delegates from Sierra Leone and leaders of the Free West Papua movement. 

Sam, from West Papua, offered solidarity to those facing persecution in Britain, pointing to the link between climate justice and migrant justice. 

He said: “We are here because police oppress indigenous people. They oppress British people. They oppress every protest for democracy. Our people is people power.”

Sam highlighted this week’s deportation flight to Jamaica, saying that those on the plane had “sacrificed their lives” to rebuild Britain.

“This is a racist system, from colonial to neocolonial, and it continues today,” he insisted.

The Home Office was approached for comment.