Tens of thousands of people turned out today to watch London’s first official St Patrick's Day Festival.
About 10,000 people, led by a band of Irish drummers and pipers, marched in the spring sunshine from London's Westminster Cathedral to join a 50,000 strong crowd in Trafalgar Square.
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The Irish Ambassador to London, Mr Daithi O'Ceallaigh, and the Minister of State at the Department of the Taoiseach, Mr Seamus Brennan, also took part in the parade.
London Mayor Ken Livingstone, who organised the celebrations, addressed the crowds from a stage underneath Nelson's Column in the middle of the square.
Mr Livingstone said the occasion marked "the first officially recognised St Patrick's Day parade in London and the first of many more to come.
"What we've done today is amazing", he said. "We are recognising the contribution that millions of Irish people have made to this city. (They) have helped to build it, to nurse the sick in it, to educate the children in it.
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"There's enough people coming up Whitehall to fill the Square again. Let's build on it year on year so that it rivals New York," he said.
Then Mr Livingstone formally declared the celebrations open to a huge cheer from the crowd as hundreds of green and white balloons were released and disappeared with the startled pigeons over the dome of the National Gallery.
Following the Mayor on stage was a range of performers, including Irish dancing troupe Celtic Feet and veteran folk band the Dubliners.
Mr Livingstone pressed ahead with the £100,000 festival despite calls that a similar event should be staged for St George, England's patron saint.
The London celebrations were welcomed by the Taoiseach, Mr Bertie Ahern.
"I am delighted that for the first time, I think in my lifetime and certainly since the Sixties, there are real St Patrick's Day festivities in London.
"This is a real step forward and does show we have moved on from some of the terrible periods of the past."
PA