Eco-extremists have doused Stonehenge, the 5,000-year-old Neolithic monument in England with Orange paint on the eve of the Summer Solstice, an important date in the celestial year associated with the stones.
Stonehenge was daubed bright orange on Wednesday, as radical environmental activists used their now-familiar tactic of reloading fire extinguishers with paint to attack buildings and places. Footage provided by the Just Stop Oil extremist group shows two people running towards the ancient stones with fire extinguishers and marking the monument.
Shockingly, despite the large number of bystanders, at first only one member of the public stepped up to prevent the vandalism. After a physically diminutive but undoubtably courageous woman tousles with one of the attackers, another member of the public then joins in and helps wrestle away a paint-projecting fire extinguisher.
Eventually, a single walkie-talkie-wielding member of English Heritage staff saunters towards the attack. Apparently unhurried, by the time the official arrives the cannister is already exhausted of paint and the incident is over. The attackers had time to pose for photographs with their work before eventually being arrested.
Just Stop Oil justified their action by saying they have to force the government into signing a “Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty to phase out fossil fuels” and said the orange dye could be washed off. The attack came just hours before the Summer Solstice, the longest day of the year. One of the most famous characteristics of Stonehenge, other than the enormous work to erect the structure by ancient peoples, is its alignment of the stones with the sun on Solstice day, channelling light into the centre of the megaliths.
Brexit leader Nigel Farage said the vandals should “go to prison” and pointed to the support given to environmental extremists by the Labour Party, who will very likely form the next UK government. As it is, Stonehenge is specifically protected by law under the UK’s Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Areas Act 1979 which makes it a criminal offence to damage the stones.
Farage’s Reform UK Party further decried the “pathetic” response of the law to previous instances of vandalism by the extremists for emboldening them, and has called for a robust response. A spokesman said: “So blinded by their misguided sense of moral superiority they will stop at nothing to destroy, damage, and disrupt. Pathetic sentencing of previous vandalism has given them a steepling sense of entitlement. However sooner or later the people of these islands will stand up to their bullying and graceless tactics. It is time the law did.”
