This article is more than 8 months old

This article is more than 8 months old

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has told a rally in London that the shooting down of a passenger plane in Tehran was an “appalling act” for which there can be “no excuses”.

Addressing a “No war on Iran” protest in Trafalgar Square on Saturday, Corbyn said the disaster, which killed 176 people, was “part of a whole pattern of appalling acts across the region”.

He added: “There’s no excuse for shooting down an airliner, there’s no excuse for a targeted assassination by one state against another.”

Iran has admitted its military accidentally shot down the Ukrainian passenger plane amid heightened tensions with the United States following the killing of senior Iranian commander Qassem Suleimani in a drone strike on 3 January.

Speaking to about a thousand demonstrators, Corbyn said: “Today let’s recognise the horror that the families of those that died in the airliner travelling from Tehran to the Ukraine are suffering from now.

“Let’s be clear there can be no excuses here … When big powers act illegally, when people step outside the norms of international law there are consequences.

“There’s no excuse for shooting down an airliner, there’s no excuse for a targeted assassination by one state against another.

“All this does is set off a spiral of violence and danger which will lead us to yet more wars in the future.”

The outgoing Labour leader was fifth on a bill of speakers organised by the Stop the War coalition, and rallied the crowd for 10 minutes as he urged the British government to “pause for a moment, take stock and stop pumping British arms in every conflict in the region”.

Corbyn used the demonstration to promise he would hold the prime minister “and his unconditional support of the US” to account.

“We cannot go on being bystanders of conflict after conflict with tens of thousands dying and millions more living out their lives as refugees, and with terrorism as a result.”

In the crowd, demonstrators were anxious and frightened. “We don’t want another Syria, we don’t want people to die, nobody wants war,” said Anam Bajwa, a lawyer from London. Her friend, Mahvish Haroon, a graphic designer, could not comprehend how the last week’s events had almost brought the world to the brink of conflict.

“In 2020, how is it possible for a new war to still be a viable route to anything? They say it is de-escalating but how much do we trust world leaders?” she asked.

On the plinth, an ad hoc stage for phlegmatic speakers, comedian Tez Ilyas called for troops to be removed from Iraq.

Winnie Omer, a Sudanese postgraduate, waved her banner – which read “Iraq is not a battlefield for your dirty wars” – up high. “We have to come out and stand up to western imperialism, its foreign policy has destroyed the Middle East,” she said. “Other people, other nations, they are called terrorists and they are undemocratic but what is this?”

The mood in the crowd was despairing but hopeful. John Usher, a trade unionist, was marching with his 16-year-old daughter, despite enduring with an illness that made it difficult to walk, even with his stick. “I am in pain but it doesn’t stop me from wanting to draw attention to the problems of our world – so many people are suffering.”