Activists paint Charles Darwin’s tomb in protest against global warming

Environmental activists in the United Kingdom painted Charles Darwin’s tomb in Westminster Abbey on Monday with the words “1.5 is dead,” referring to the critical climate threshold the world temporarily surpassed in 2024.

The two Just Stop Oil activists entered London’s Westminster Abbey, where Darwin is buried alongside some of Britain’s most famous figures, at around 10 a.m. local time, according to London’s Metropolitan Police. London and a statement from the group.

There, the activists said: “We passed the 1.5 degree limit that was supposed to keep us safe. Millions are being displaced, California is burning, and we have lost three-quarters of all wildlife since the 1970s,” according to Just Stop Oil’s statement.

Scientists confirmed last week that 2024 was the hottest year on record and the first calendar year to breach a crucial climate target – the pledge to restrict global warming to 1.5 degrees above average temperature before humans start burning. large quantities of fossil fuels.

Last year was 1.6 degrees Celsius warmer, according to new data released on Friday (10) by the European climate monitoring agency Copernicus.

Scientists are more concerned about exceeding 1.5 degrees over decades rather than individual years, since above this level humans and ecosystems struggle to adapt. But they say the record 2024 is another alarming sign of where the planet is headed.

Protesters also referred to the biodiversity crisis.

“Darwin would be turning in his grave if he knew we were in the midst of the sixth mass extinction,” said the campaigners, who are demanding the UK government work to phase out the extraction and burning of fossil fuels by 2030.

Some scientists say we have entered a sixth mass extinction, with large numbers of species being wiped out in a human-driven crisis that has destroyed habitats and triggered a climate crisis.

Images released by Just Stop Oil showed two protesters – one aged 66 and the other aged 77 – sitting cross-legged on the ground near Darwin’s grave, which Just Stop Oil said had been painted with spray chalk, a type of washable material. and non-toxic.

British police told CNN that the two women were arrested on “suspicion of causing criminal damage with what is believed to be powder paint in Westminster Abbey”.

Just Stop Oil has organized several protests in response to the climate crisis in recent years, including throwing tomato soup over Van Gogh’s “Sunflowers” ​​and spraying orange powder paint on Britain’s most famous prehistoric structure, Stonehenge.

There have been more than 3,000 arrests of Just Stop Oil activists since the group was formed in 2022, according to the group. The majority of these arrests occurred for planning or executing direct actions, including slow marches – a tactic often used to block traffic. Other activists, who defaced works of art and famous buildings, were arrested and charged with criminal damage and trespassing.

In September 2024, five Just Stop Oil activists received what is believed to be the longest sentence in UK history for non-violent protests.

This content was originally published in Activists paint Charles Darwin’s grave in protest against global warming on the CNN Brasil website.

Source: CNN Brasil

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