Yesterday morning we rang out the names of the dead on the barriers in front of Downing Street.

The police around us, the Prime Minister's office in front of us, a friend of ours being harassed and searched across the road for filming us, under the threat of arrest, we read out the names of Iraqi civilians and of British soldiers.

Somehow, reading each name felt more painful than it had in Brighton or in Northwood. Somehow, the ceremony of remembrance had become more moving in these strange circumstances.

There is some deep human need not to be forgotten. We want to be remembered by those who come after us; we want to be remembered and respected.

Those who have died in this war, Iraq and Western, will be forgotten, and their memory not respected, if the leaders of this war have their way.

Reading the names of the dead, marking their passing with each ring of a bell, has been a meditation on the reason why we campaign about Iraq.

It has been a way of insisting that these people matter, that the