Just Stop Oil protesters attack glass protecting Magna Carta
The British Library says the document from the 13th Century wasn't damaged
Last updated 10th May 2024
Two Just Stop Oil protesters in their 80s have smashed the glass protecting Magna Carta at the British Library.
The climate campaign group also says the two women - Reverend Dr Sue Parfitt, 82, and Judy Bruce, 85 - glued their hands together as they demanded an emergency plan to stop fossil fuels by 2030.
They are demanding the UK government commit to ending the extraction and burning of oil, gas and coal.
The Metropolitan police say two people have been arrested on suspicion of criminal damage and are in custody.
Rev Parfitt said: "The Magna Carta is rightly revered, being of great importance to our history, to our freedoms and to our laws. But there will be no freedom, no lawfulness, no rights, if we allow climate breakdown to become the catastrophe that is now threatened."
"We must get things in proportion. The abundance of life on earth, the climate stability that allows civilisation to continue is what must be revered and protected above all else, even above our most precious artefacts."
Ms Bruce said: "This week 400 respected scientists - contributors to IPCC reports, are saying we are 'woefully unprepared' for what's coming: 2.5 or more degrees of heating above pre industrial levels.
"Instead of acting, our dysfunctional Government is like the three monkeys: 'see nothing, hear nothing, say nothing- pretend we've got 25 years.. we haven't!
"We must get off our addiction to oil and gas by 2030 - starting now."
The library says the police were called and document from the 13th century was undamaged, but the Treasures Gallery is temporarily closed until further notice.
Just Stop Oil say the women entered the British Library at around 10:40am (10th May) and smashed the glass enclosure that surrounds the Magna Carta- the ‘Great Charter’ that is an essential foundation for the contemporary powers of Parliament.
Why target the Magna Carta?
A Just Stop Oil Spokesperson said: “Clause 39 of the Magna Carta is one of four clauses still enshrined in UK common law, a so-called ‘golden passage’, that states: ‘No free man is to be arrested, or imprisoned, or in any other way ruined, except by the lawful judgement of his peers or by the law of the land.”
“Contrast that with civil law as it stands in 2024, where corporations are buying private laws in the form of injunctions that circumvent the people’s rights to a trial by jury for speaking out against the crimes of oil companies.”
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