Portrait of the Week – 15 February 2003

Thousands prepared to march to Hyde Park in London to demonstrate opposition to war against Iraq; they included Mr Charles Kennedy, the leader of the Liberal Democrat party. About 400 soldiers from the Grenadier Guards and Household Cavalry with armoured cars began to patrol Heathrow airport, authorised by Mr Tony Blair, the Prime Minister. The England cricket team decided not to play in the World Cup in Zimbabwe out of fear of a death threat, they said. On television Mr Blair gave Mr Jeremy Paxman an undertaking about the number of applications for asylum being made: ‘I would like to see us reduce it by 30-40 per cent in the next few months, and I think by September of this year we should have it halved.’ Mr David Blunkett, the Home Secretary, was said to have remarked that this target was ‘undeliverable’, but Home Office spokesmen said Mr Blair had been ‘indicating what our broad expectation of the policy is’.