Police clear Waterloo Bridge as 1,000 Extinct Rebellion protesters arrested

Police have cleared the remaining Extinction Rebellion activists from Waterloo Bridge in London as the number of arrests rose to almost 1,000 protesters.

The roads around Parliament Square were cleared of protesters earlier on Sunday and Waterloo Bridge was reopened to traffic later that day. During the night, the police still continued to remove the last activists.

The eco-warriors started their demonstrations a week ago and are still urging governments to find a solution to the disastrous impacts that will come from climate change and global warming.

The last protester on the bridge, a 70-year-old woman said: “I have been a nurse and a childminder most of my life. The world we are leaving for the children and grandchildren is going to be horrendous and we let it happen. It happened on our watch. So we have to stand up and fight or lie down and fight.”

The Metropolitan police requested 200 extra officers to help deal with the protests as Extinct Rebellion announced there would be a “people’s assembly” at Marble Arch on Monday to decide how to continue the non-violent campaign.

Greta Thunberg, the teenage climate campaigner from Sweden, made a speech in solidarity with the protesters in Marble Arch.

“I come from Sweden and back there it’s almost the same problem as here, as everywhere, that nothing is being done to stop an ecological crisis despite all the beautiful words and promises,” she said.

“We will never stop fighting. We are now facing an existential crisis, the climate crisis and ecological crisis which have never been treated as crises before. They have been ignored for decades and for way too long the politicians and the people in power have gotten away with not doing anything. We will make sure that politicians will not get away with it for any longer,” she added.