LONDON: Film star Emma Thompson joined climate change activists in a central London shopping district on Friday to read poetry praising Earth’s bounties, part of five days of protests which clogged the British capital with transport snarl-ups.
Organizers Extinction Rebellion have called for non-violent civil disobedience to force the British government to reduce net greenhouse gas emissions to zero by 2025 and stop what they call a global climate crisis.
The protests did not cause major travel disruption on Friday during one of Britain’s biggest holiday weekends, but police said they have now arrested more than 682 people.
Extinction Rebellion blocked several locations in central London this week after staging a semi-nude protest in parliament earlier this month.
“Our planet is in serious trouble,” Thompson told reporters amid a crowd of about 300 activists, according to eye witnesses. She addressed them from a pink boat in the middle of London’s Oxford Circus as shoppers and tourists milled past.
“We are here in this island of sanity and it makes me so happy to be able to join you all and to add my voice to the young people here who have inspired a whole new movement,” said Thompson, one of Britain’s most acclaimed actresses who has won two Academy awards.
She was one of several actors who read poems celebrating the beauty of nature.
The activists formed a human chain around the boat, with one attached to its main mast making it extremely difficult for the police to dislodge him.
After a painstaking operation, they removed him and secured the boat, but had difficulty transporting the vessel away because more protesters continually sat in their path.
“The serious disruption the demonstrations are causing to people in London and beyond is unacceptable and we completely understand the concern it is causing to those who are disrupted by it,” police said in a statement.
Thompson’s appearance followed a demonstration near Heathrow Airport earlier, where a group of around a dozen teenagers, some as young as 13 and 14, held a banner alongside a busy road which read: “Are we the last generation?“
Some of the teenagers wept and hugged each other, although they were far outnumbered by police.
“I fear for my future” Oscar Idle, 17, told Reuters at Heathrow. “That fear gives me courage to act.”
“I want to live in a society which is not catastrophic, where there is not going to be food shortages, wild fires and hurricanes where people can live,” he said.
Emma Thompson, weeping teenagers join peaceful climate protest in London
Emma Thompson, weeping teenagers join peaceful climate protest in London
- Oscar-winning actress Emma Thompson joined a rally by the Extinction Rebellion protesters in central London
- London police say more than 570 climate protesters have been arrested since the protests began 4 days ago
Guinea confirms detention of 16 Sierra Leonean soldiers
- Guinea said late Tuesday the soldiers entered the Koudaya district in the Faranah region without authorization
- Guinea said its forces seized their equipment and supplies
CONAKRY: Guinea’s military confirmed the detention of 16 Sierra Leonean soldiers after accusing them of crossing the border and raising their flag on Guinean soil.
The two West African countries have been involved in a border dispute for more than two decades, stemming from the Sierra Leonean Civil War between 1991 and 2002. Sierra Leone’s government had invited Guinea to help defend its eastern borders during the war, but the Guinean troops didn’t completely withdraw after the war.
The GuineanMinistry of National Defense said in a statement, issued late Tuesday, the soldiers entered the district of Koudaya in Faranah, a border region in Guinea, without authorization, where they“set up a tent and raised their national flag”. Guinean authorities also seized their equipment and supplies.
The Sierra Leonean authorities earlier Tuesday said several members of a security unit, including an officer, had been apprehended while making bricks fora border post in Kalieyereh in the district of Falaba on Monday.
Last year, the Guinean military entered a mineral-rich border town in Sierra Leone, reigniting the tension.
