Two environmentalists from Just Stop Oil sprayed orange powder paint on the Stonehenge archaeological site near Salisbury, Wiltshire in England. This was announced by Wiltshire police, explaining that the two activists were arrested on charges of damaging the monument. British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak condemned the action, calling it a “shameful act of vandalism”. Just Stop Oil identified the two protesters as Niamh Lynch, a 21-year-old student from Oxford, and Rajan Naidu, a 73-year-old from Birmingham. The group said the orange powder was corn starch and would be “washed away with rain.” The protest comes on the eve of the start of the Summer Solstice celebrations being held at the UNESCO world heritage site. Curators are investigating the extent of the damage.
Just Stop Oil said it was protesting to call on the next British government to end the extraction and burning of oil, gas and coal by 2030. “Continuing to burn coal, oil and gas will result in the deaths of millions of people. We must unite to defend humanity otherwise we will risk everything,” a spokesperson for the group said. Mike Pitts, archaeologist and author of How to Build Stonehenge, told the BBC that what happened was “potentially quite worrying”. Pitts recalled that «the monument has been fenced off for decades and the surfaces of the megaliths are protected. They are sensitive and are completely covered in prehistoric markings that have yet to be thoroughly studied and any superficial damage to the stones is extremely worrying.” Furthermore, he added, “an exceptional lichen garden has grown on the megaliths.”
