An image of a man urinating next to the memorial to murdered officer PC Keith Palmer has provoked outrage.
The image was taken as tensions rose between far-right protesters and police in central London.
Palmer was killed as he tried to protect parliament from a terrorist attack on 22 March, 2017.
The picture, which has been widely circulated on Twitter, shows a man relieving himself right next to Palmer’s plaque which was erected outside the Palace of Westminster last February.
Tobias Ellwood, the Tory MP who gave first aid to the dying police officer in his final moments of life, said that he found the image to be “abhorrent”.
Absolute shame on this man. Of all the images to emerge over these few testing days I find this one of most abhorr… https://t.co/lly9p3Q3wz— Tobias Ellwood MP (@Tobias Ellwood MP) 1592060710
The PC Palmer plaque is only a short distance from the statue of Winston Churchill, which is being “protected” by far-right protesters, despite the fact that Black Lives Matter protests were called off and that the statue has been boarded up for safety purposes already.
Across the capital there have been disturbing scenes of violence and aggression towards police officers and journalists from the far-right protesters, who have thrown punches and bottles. Some protesters were even seen doing what appeared to be Nazi salutes near the cenotaph war memorial.
On social media, people were furious about this photo, not least because protesters claim to “respect” memorials and urinating by a plaque doesn’t seem to be very respectful.
This picture from Alamy really says it all about the protests today. PC Palmer gave his life to try and stop a ter… https://t.co/wrSeCoENAi— Alastair Thompson (@Alastair Thompson) 1592060104
Absolutely disgusting. Man urinates on PC Palmer memorial https://t.co/F82XIIcApK https://t.co/VfeywcbBvS— Otto English (@Otto English) 1592060216
Though he was unarmed, in 2017 PC Keith Palmer stopped a knife-wielding terrorist from entering the Palace of Westm… https://t.co/9xgSvm53fu— Rachel Clarke (@Rachel Clarke) 1592063088
They cry over slave trader statues like Edward Colston & Robert Milligan being taken down while pissing on memorial… https://t.co/dv0Ud5Vunv— Turkish Football (@Turkish Football) 1592061617
Absolutely repulsive. I was there when Parliament came under attack form a terrorist in 2017 and PC Palmer paid wit… https://t.co/6ThRXSh3pz— Rupa Huq MP (@Rupa Huq MP) 1592065919
Truly distressing scenes.