Climate change protesters aim for financial districts

LONDON: Climate change activists have targeted London’s financial districts to highlight what they call the business world’s “role in our collective suicide” on the 10th and final day of disruptive protests.

Extinction Rebellion (XR) demonstrators temporarily blockaded the London Stock Exchange by gluing themselves across entrances to the trading hub in the City of London early on Thursday morning. They were un-attached before being taken away in police vans, with Scotland Yard saying 13 people had been arrested on suspicion of aggravated trespassing. The Exchange said all markets were open as normal.

Elsewhere, five protesters including 83-year-old grandfather Phil Kingston clambered onto the roof of a DLR train at Canary Wharf station in east London, holding signs, saying “business as usual = death” and “don’t jail the canaries”.

British Transport Police (BTP) used ropes, ladders and harnesses to remove them before confirming five people were arrested on suspicion of obstructing the railway. In central London, dozens of XR members including drummers and banner-carriers could be seen demonstrating outside offices of bankers Goldman Sachs on Fleet Street.

The group moved down the road and blockaded it at intervals, with around a dozen buses seen stuck on either side of the blockade. Police said 13 people were arrested on suspicion of aggravated trespassing in Fleet Street. Organisers say groups will target up to 10 locations by “swarming” areas including the Bank of England and Rothschild and Co in the City of London, and Deutsche Bank near Liverpool Street.

XR said its action in the City of London was likely to last a few hours, on the day the group is due to end blockades at Parliament Square and Marble Arch. An XR spokeswoman said Thursday’s targets were selected because “the financial industry is responsible for funding climate and ecological destruction and we are calling on them, the companies and the institutions that allow this to happen, to tell the truth”.

The spokeswoman added the sign “business as usual = death” was a reference to “the financial sector’s role in our collective suicide”.Eco-protesters have urged ministers to declare a climate emergency to avoid what it calls a “sixth mass extinction” of species on Earth.