The Scotsman

Police charge 26 after Extinction Rebellion protests at printworks

● Labour’s Abbott condemned for likening demonstrat­ors to suffragett­es

- By CONOR MATCHETT BRIAN MONTEITH, PAGE XX

Twenty-six people have been charged with aggravated trespass following a protest at newspaper printers on Merseyside.

The charges follow protests by environmen­talist group Extinction Rebellion who blocked papers from leaving the depots of Newsprinte­rs at Knowsley, near Liverpool, and Broxbourne, Hertfordsh­ire, on Friday night.

Police confirmed the 26 people, aged between 19 and 60, will appear in court in Liverpool and St Helens on 8 and 13 January next year.

All have been granted bail under the condition they do not enter Merseyside or contact employees of News Internatio­nal, which owns the printers.

Labour MP Abbott defended the protesters, likening them to the suffragett­es and stating the protest was a “legal tactic”.

She told Sky News: “They’re not criminals, they’re protesters and activists in the tradition of the suffragett­es and the hunger marches of the 1930s.” Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab rejected her comments and said the protests were damaging to the cause of climate change.

He said on Ridge on Sunday: “I’m astounded at Diane Abbott’ s remarks. The idea that it is right to damage property or intervene with a free press in the name of progressiv­e protest is, I think, perverse.

“Actually, I think it is damaging to the cause of climate change.

“I respect the right of peaceful protest but hijacking that with a militant agenda to disrupt the very heart of democratic debate, which is through a free media, is just totally wrong and we’re against it, and I think law enforcemen­t action should be taken to preserve our wider freedoms, and they do include a free media.”

Mr Raab had earlier said that police had the powers needed to deal with protests amid the Home Office’s moves to review the legal status of Extinction Rebellion and potentiall­y reclassify it as an organised crime group in order to deal with protests with more force.

He said: “We always keep all of our laws under review but I think actually the laws are in place to take relevant enforcemen­t action against criminal behaviour.”

Pressed on the issue again, Mr Raab added: “I think from everything I’ve seen today, we have the enforcemen­t powers necessary to ensure that kind of behaviour we saw overnight is not repeated.”

Sir Ed Davey, leader of the Liberal Democrats, said Extinction Rebellion protesters were “shooting themselves in the foot” with their blockade.

Asked whether he agreed with Ms Abbott, he said: “No … I think we need to bring the country together to realise we have a climate emergency alongside the Covid health and economic emergency.

“My concern with what we saw was that it actually divides people, it can undermine the message about the climate emergency. I fear that when you damage the free press in particular, that is shooting yourself in the foot.”

 ??  ?? 0 A member of Extinction Rebellion is arrested in London’strafalgar Square last week during its spate of disruptive demonstrat­ions across the UK
0 A member of Extinction Rebellion is arrested in London’strafalgar Square last week during its spate of disruptive demonstrat­ions across the UK

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