Just Stop Oil protesters spray Rolex store in Knightsbridge with orange paint after similar acts at luxury car showrooms

28 October 2022, 12:17

Two Just Stop Oil protesters have sprayed the front of Rolex's London store with orange paint from a fire extinguisher, after a similar protest at luxury car showrooms on Wednesday.

The two eco-protesters defaced the front of the high-end jewellers in Knightsbridge at around 8.30am, JSO said.

The stunt comes after three weeks of daily protests, which included activists blocking the Dartford Crossing and gluing themselves to various roads.

Adrian Johnson, 56, a former deputy headteacher from Perthshire, Scotland, said: "The science is clear.

"The breakdown of the climate is here and it is due to the extraction and use of fossil fuels.

"Any new fossil fuel projects will cause irreparable damage to the climate. This may have already happened.

"And yet, this is the path our government is following by granting over 100 new oil and gas licences. It makes no sense and it's reckless beyond belief."

Jennifer Kowalski, 26, an environmental scientist from Glasgow, said: "People around the world are starving, suffering and dying so an elite can spend vast fortunes on vanity items."

Just Stop Oil has called on the government to suspend all new fossil fuel licences to protect the environment.

The Metropolitan Police said they were "quickly on the scene" by 8.43am and arrested two activists on suspicion of criminal damage.

"They have been taken into custody at a central London police station," a spokesperson for the force said.

This latest direct action from the coalition of groups comes after newly-appointed PM Rishi Sunak reversed his predecessor Liz Truss's decision to lift the ban on fracking, though new oil licenses have been green lit on the North Sea.

Speaking to Sky News, Professor Lorenzo Fioramonti, director of the University of Surrey's Institute for Sustainability, said the JSO's strategies are "backfiring" and risk "dividing the ecological front" and "tainting the cause" of groups who are engaged in constructive dialogue with big business, governments, and fossil foil producers.