Battle of Waterloo Bridge: a week of Extinction Rebellion protests – “Are we the the last generation?”
By Matthew Taylor and Damien Gayle
20 April 2019
(The Guardian) – On Monday morning a strange sight appeared, edging its way through the buses, taxis and shoppers on Oxford Street in London.
A bright pink boat, named Berta Cáceres after the murdered Honduran environmental activist, was being pulled carefully through the traffic, eventually coming to a halt in the middle of one of London’s busiest thoroughfares.
Bemused onlookers watched as activists secured Berta to the road, while others glued themselves to its garish hull. And with this act of flamboyant defiance, Extinction Rebellion’s climate protests had begun.
In the five days that followed, thousand of people, from pensioners to young parents with toddlers, scientists to city workers, teenagers to teachers, have occupied four landmarks in the capital, defying repeated police attempts to remove them and causing widespread disruption. Smaller disruptive events have taken place across the UK and in 33 other countries.
By late Friday evening police were saying that 682 people had been arrested in London. Three supporters who glued themselves to a train on Wednesday have been imprisoned. That same day four more attached themselves to the fence outside Jeremy Corbyn’s house, declaring the Labour leader “the best hope this country has got” to meet the challenges of the unfolding climate crisis.
And on Friday about 20 young protesters, all born after 1990, unfurled a banner on a road outside Heathrow airport, asking: “Are we the the last generation?”
But perhaps the protesters’ biggest achievement is that millions of people have heard their message that the world is in a spiralling climate emergency that demands transformative change to avoid catastrophe. [more]
Battle of Waterloo Bridge: a week of Extinction Rebellion protests
Extinction Rebellion activists stop coal train in Brisbane
19 April 2019 (Australian Associated Press) – One protester is in custody and another was taken to hospital after Extinction Rebellion activists stepped in front of a moving coal train headed for the Port of Brisbane.
The train driver was forced to slam on the emergency brakes after a group of protesters climbed on to the freight tracks in Wynnum on Thursday afternoon, police said.
“Then three men approached the carriages [and] one of them got up on to the carriage … the man wouldn’t come down,” a police spokesman said on Friday.
Officers coaxed him down about 7.45pm and he was charged with obstructing the railway, trespass and obstructing police. He remains in custody and will appear in the Cleveland magistrates court on Saturday. […]
An Extinction Rebellion activist, Emma Dorge, said the group was protesting against the lack of action in Australia in response to the global climate crisis.
“We can’t wait any more, we’re taking direct action so people understand the danger the planet is in,” she said. [more]
