A peace campaigner who sat outside the British Houses of Parliament for a decade in protest at the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq has died, aged 62.
Brian Haw died in his sleep on Saturday after a long battle with lung cancer, which forced him finally to give up his vigil on Parliament Square in London.
The former carpenter became a symbol of the anti-war campaign and of civil activism with his round-the-clock protest which began on 2 June 2001 against sanctions imposed on Saddam Hussein's Iraq by his government and other Western nations, AFP reports.
His anger only grew when Britain joined the United States invasion of Afghanistan later that year following the September 11 attacks, and the war in Iraq in 2003.
Mr Haw sat in a makeshift camp on the footpath opposite Big Ben, surrounded by banners and pictures of war victims being seen by MPs and tourists every day.
Authorities tried repeatedly to get rid of him, including introducing a new law to restrict demonstrations within 1km of the Houses of Parliament, but he continually fought against them.
