A court in Malmo fined Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg. Only a few hours later, officers carried her off the street during another protest.
Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg has been fined for disobeying a police order during a climate protest. Thunberg admitted in a Malmö court on Monday that she refused to leave a blockade at the port in Malmö during the protest in mid-June. She justified this with the necessity of her protest due to the climate crisis – and took part in a similar action just a few hours after the verdict.
“In my opinion, we are in an emergency situation, and that’s why my action was legitimate,” Thunberg told journalists after the trial. The judge did not follow this reasoning. He fined the activist the equivalent of around 130 euros. The 20-year-old also has to pay the equivalent of a good 85 euros to a fund for victims of crime. The maximum penalty for Thunberg’s offense is six months in prison, but this is rarely used on these types of allegations.
Disobeying a police order
As a 15-year-old, Thunberg began to sit in front of the Swedish parliament in Stockholm during class time on Fridays to demonstrate for more effective climate protection measures. Their weekly strike expanded into the global Fridays for Future protest movement in just a few months. Thunberg ended her school strikes in June after graduating from school and announced that she wanted to find other forms of protest. In mid-June, Thunberg took part in an action organized by the environmental protection group Ta tillbaka framtiden (Taking back the future) in Malmö. The activists tried to block entrances and exits to the port. “We don’t just want to watch, we want to physically stop fossil fuel infrastructure,” Greta Thunberg wrote on Instagram at the time. The young activist regularly denounces governments in harsh language for their inaction in combating the climate crisis. According to the indictment, Thunberg took part in a demonstration “which disrupted traffic” and “refused to follow police requests”.
Swedish activist
Greta Thunberg supports Lützerath: This is her life
Greta Thunberg: “Won’t give in”
When asked if she would be more cautious about her protests in the future, Thunberg said she would “definitely not back down.” “We know we can’t save the world by playing by the rules,” added the activist. Ta tillbaka framtiden was also undeterred after the verdict: “If the court prefers to see our action as a crime, it can do that, but we know we have the right to live and the fossil fuel industry stands in the way,” spokeswoman Irma Kjellstrom told the AFP news agency. A few hours after the verdict, Thunberg took part in a protest similar to the one in June. Sitting on the road to Malmo port, she held up a placard that read, “I’m blocking tankers.” The action was broken up by the police, and the six participants, including Thunberg, were taken away.
Source: Stern
I have been working in the news industry for over 6 years, first as a reporter and now as an editor. I have covered politics extensively, and my work has appeared in major newspapers and online news outlets around the world. In addition to my writing, I also contribute regularly to 24 Hours World.
