LONDON — Two climate protesters were arrested Wednesday after spraying orange paint on the ancient Stonehenge monument in southern England, police said.
The latest Just Stop Oil action was immediately condemned by Prime Minister Rishi Shankar as a “shameful act of vandalism”.
Video of the incident shows two men running towards the 4,500-year-old stone circle and splashing orange berries as a third man tries to stop them. A few stones were painted orange.
According to Just Stop Oil's website, the pigment was made from an “orange cornflour” that would wash away in the rain.
The incident came before thousands of people were expected to gather at the prehistoric site to celebrate the summer solstice – the longest day of the year.
English Heritage, which manages the UNESCO World Heritage site, said it was “deeply disturbing” and said curators were investigating the damage.
Wiltshire Police said the pair were arrested on suspicion of damaging one of the world's most famous prehistoric monuments.
Stonehenge was built on the flat lands of Salisbury Plain in phases beginning 5,000 years ago, with the unique stone circle dating back to the late Neolithic around 2,500 BC. About 150 miles away, but the origin of the others remains a mystery.
Just Stop Oil is one of a number of groups in Europe that have disrupted sporting events, sprayed paint and food on famous works of art and disrupted traffic to draw attention to global warming. has gotten attention — and it's gotten a lot of blowback.
The group said it acted in response to the Labor Party's recent election manifesto. Labor has said it will not issue any more licenses for oil and gas exploration if it wins the July 4 election. Just Stop Oil supported the moratorium but said it was not enough.
In a statement, the group said Labour, which is leading the polls and widely expected by pundits and politicians to lead the next government, should go further and phase out fossil fuels by 2030. A contract needs to be signed.
The group said in a statement that millions of people would die as a result of continuing to burn coal, oil and gas.
According to the Just Stop Oil website, the workers who sprayed the pigment were 21-year-old Oxford student Niamh Lynch and 73-year-old Rajan Naidoo from Birmingham.