Religious leaders are touring London’s East End tonight to get rid of drug dens in the run-up to next year’s Olympics.

Leaders from churches, mosques and civil organisations meet at Watney Street Market for the planned walk through Shadwell and Whitechapel on a fact-finding campaign being staged by Telco, The East London Communities Organisation umbrella group.

“We want action to get rid of crack dens and other areas where drug-dealing is taking place,” a leading Telco organiser told the East London Advertiser.

“We’ve discovered illegal drug dens operating close to schools and where children play in an area that’s so close to where the 2012 Olympics are being staged.”

They have already located a playground in Ford Square, Whitechapel, where evidence of drug dealing has been found in a children’s playground, and a boarded-up house in Cavell Street nearby that’s believed to be frequented by cocaine addicts.