Greta Thunberg (AP)
The well-known climate activist Greta Thunberg gave the assorted media outside the Westminster Magistrate’s Court little to run with on Friday, before bolting off from the scene herself. The 21-year-old was acquitted of a public order offence.
Legal proceedings had been brought against Thunberg and her fellow climate protesters, after they picketed the Energy Intelligence Forum gathering in October 2023. In total, five of the demonstrators were arrested.
Judge John Law – a superb name, by the way – ruled that London’s Metropolitan Police acted unlawfully in imposing conditions on the protest, meaning Thunberg had no case to answer. He also blasted a ‘lack of clarity’ from the authorities.
The justifications for the arrests were balked at by legal officials, and the charges against Greta Thunberg and her comrades were thrown out of court yesterday. However, the combative Swede wasn’t finished there.
In a sensational bit of trolling, Thunberg appeared to stop and speak to reporters for a brief moment. However, it became abundantly clear that this would be a very short impromptu news conference.
She then yelled ‘your mum’ to the press pack, before her group ran away from the court. Put that on the front page…
This was not Greta Thunberg’s only brush with the law in recent months. She was also detained with other protesters after they stopped traffic in the oil terminal of Malmo’s Port on 19 June.
Ms Thunberg was also among hundreds of people who joined anti-mining protests at multiple locations in the western German state of North Rhine-Westphalia in January 2023, where she was famously carried away from the scene by police officers.
However, her trademark spirited defiance shows no signs of withering, here…
