The New York Times - 08.10.2019

THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONALTUESDAY, OCTOBER 8, 2019 0 N A

LONDON — The climate group
Extinction Rebellion blocked all
major roads around Britain’s Par-
liament on Monday in protests the
organization said would last two
weeks.
Hundreds of activists occupied
Trafalgar Square, a major land-
mark, as well as Westminster
Bridge, with drummers entertain-
ing protesters as they set up tents.
Smaller protest sites were set
up outside government depart-
ments, including the Ministry of
Defense.
Although the protests were fo-
cused on London, activists took to
the streets around the world, in-
cluding blocking roadways in Aus-
tralia and New Zealand.
In New York, 27 protesters were
arrested as they staged a funeral
march from Battery Park to
Washington Square Park, accord-
ing to the Police Department. Pro-
testers could be seen on Facebook
Live standing in a road covered in
fake blood.
In Germany, hundreds of people
responded to the activists’ call to
block the traffic circle around the
Victory Column in Berlin early
Monday, sealing off a key transit
point between the formerly divid-
ed capital’s east and west dis-
tricts. The Berlin police said the
protests were peaceful, and traffic
remained fluid as drivers diverted
to alternate routes.
Later in the day, dozens of activ-
ists also blocked Potsdamer Platz,
while activists set up a camp in a
park facing the Reichstag to serve
as their headquarters for a week
of protests.
In the Netherlands, over 100
people were arrested, the BBC
said, after they tried to set up a
tent city on a main road outside
the Rijksmuseum, one of the city’s
main visitor attractions.
It is the second time Extinction
Rebellion has shut down swathes
of central London in six months.
In April, the group installed a pink
boat emblazoned with the words
“Tell the Truth” in Oxford Circus, a
major shopping area, and occu-
pied several bridges, holding con-
certs and yoga classes on them.
The Metropolitan Police said in
a statement published on its web-
site that it had arrested 276 people
by 6:15 p.m. on Monday. The state-
ment did not give further details,
such as an estimate of the num-

bers involved in the protest.

At first, it seemed that Mon-

day’s protests in London — adver-

tised on Extinction Rebellion’s

website and discussed with the

police — might be less successful

than previous ones, because the

authorities tried to clamp down on

them in advance.

On Saturday, the Metropolitan

Police raided a building in south

London and confiscated portable

toilets and other equipment in-

tended for the sit-ins, making

eight arrests. At 8 a.m. on Monday,

dozens of police officers stood on

the two bridges around Parlia-

ment and were seen conducting

searches of people thought to be

activists, and warning them not to

congregate.

“I’m on my own, waiting for a

protest to happen,” said Dave

Buchan, 37, who was on Lambeth

Bridge looking for other Extinc-

tion Rebellion members.

Mr. Buchan had traveled five

hours from Hull, in northeast Eng-

land, to be at the protest because,

he said, humanity “won’t last very

long if it keeps on going on as we

are.”

Around 9:30 a.m., hundreds of

protesters emerged from coffee

shops to occupy the sites, said Ju-

liet Bottle, 27, a doctor and spokes-

woman for the group. They had re-

ceived a signal to start the occupa-

tion via the secure messaging app

Telegram, she said.

“We intend to be here for two

weeks,” Ms. Bottle said.

Other actions planned during

the next two weeks include an oc-

cupation of London City Airport, a

favorite of business travelers.

The police let protesters occupy

the roads, Ms. Bottle said, but im-

pounded anything they thought

could be used to form a camp.

“They’ve surrounded a set of

kitchen sinks,” she said, pointing

to them in the middle of Trafalgar

Square, where several protesters

were dancing on a scaffold they

had erected.

XR, as Extinction Rebellion’s

members call it, uses nonviolent

mass disruption to increase

awareness of climate change and

force action on the issue, such as

persuading governments to de-

clare a climate emergency and to

set targets for net zero green-

house gas emissions by 2025.

The group — in a major depar-

ture from past environmental

movements in Britain — urges its

members to get arrested so they

can also use the courts as a plat-

form. It also calls for actions to fo-

cus on capital cities to maximize

disruption, rather than more tra-

ditional sites of protest in Britain

like power stations.

The organization was estab-

lished only last year, with its initial

actions — including an occupation

of Greenpeace’s offices — attract-

ing just a few dozen people. But it

has boomed since.

In July, Policy Exchange, a

think tank with close ties to the

Conservative Party, issued a re-

port calling the group “an extre-

mist organization whose methods

need to be confronted and chal-

lenged rather than supported and

condoned.” But it admitted the

group was having a “honeymoon”

period with both the public and

the government.

In April, several XR members

met Michael Gove, who was then

secretary of state for the envi-

ronment, and in May, the Parlia-

ment declared a “climate emer-

gency,” one of the group’s three de-

mands.

Climate Protest Group Furiously Clogs the Streets of Cities Worldwide

By ALEX MARSHALL

CHRIS J RATCLIFFE/GETTY IMAGES

ROMY FERNANDEZ/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE — GETTY IMAGES

Clockwise from top: The Red Brigade of the Invisible Circus marching on Westminster Bridge in London on Monday; an Extinction

Rebellion activist arrested by the police during a sit-in on a road in Sydney, Australia; and protesters blocking a bridge in Amsterdam.

PETER PARKS/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE — GETTY IMAGES

Melissa Eddy contributed report-
ing from Berlin.

BLOOD AND GRAVESTONES IN N.Y.

Protesters kicked off five days of

civil disobedience with jarring

scenes across the city. Page A18.

LONDON — Prime Minister
Boris Johnson called on Monday
for the wife of an American diplo-
mat involved in a crash that killed
a teenager to return to Britain,
saying he would ask President
Trump to intervene if the impasse
was not resolved through diplo-
matic channels.
Mr. Johnson’s statement — in
which he also disclosed the wom-
an’s identity — aggravated ten-
sions in a trans-Atlantic relation-
ship that started fraying after Mr.
Trump feuded publicly with other
British officials and denounced
Britain’s ambassador to Washing-
ton, forcing him to give up his
post.
“I do not think that it can be
right to use the process of diplo-
matic immunity for this type of
purpose,” Mr. Johnson said in an
interview with the BBC on Mon-
day, “and I hope that Anne
Sacoolas will come back and will
engage properly with the pro-
cesses of laws that carried out in
this country.”
Mr. Johnson added that, if nec-
essary, he would raise the issue
“personally with the White
House.”
The British authorities have
been pressing the United States to
reconsider its refusal to intervene
in an investigation of the crash on
Aug. 27, after Ms. Sacoolas, an
American citizen who has diplo-
matic immunity, left Britain de-
spite telling the police that she
had no plans to do so.
Harry Dunn, 19, was killed after
his motorcycle collided with a car
traveling in the opposite direction
in Brackley, a town about 60 miles
northeast of London that is near
R.A.F. Croughton, a Royal Air
Force base that is the site of a
United States Air Force communi-
cation station.
The police have said that Ms.
Sacoolas, 42, was driving on the
wrong side of the road when the
crash occurred, and that their in-
vestigation has been complicated
by the fact that she left the coun-
try.
The developments have
prompted a diplomatic tug of war,
after Britain transmitted a formal
request for a waiver of immunity
to the United States Embassy in
London on Sept. 5 that was de-
clined eight days later.
The embassy on Monday de-
clined to confirm the woman’s
identity — she is reportedly the
wife of an American diplomat —
but said it was unlikely to lift im-
munity in the case.
Superintendent Sarah Johnson,

head of operations for the

Northamptonshire police, said in

a statement on Saturday that the

police had sought documentation

“to allow for the arrest and formal

interview of the subject.”

“Harry Dunn’s family deserves

justice, and in order to achieve

this, a full and thorough investiga-

tion, with the assistance of all par-

ties involved, needs to take place,”

she said.

The police are also working

closely with the Foreign and Com-

monwealth Office, Ms. Johnson

said, adding

that they were

“exploring all

opportunities

through diplo-

matic chan-

nels” to ensure

the investiga-

tion’s progress.

Harry

Dunn’s mother,

Charlotte

Charles, has been pushing to have

the American woman’s immunity

waived and for her to return to

Britain.

“President Trump, please lis-

ten,” Ms. Charles told Sky News,

the outlet that first reported on the

identity of the 42-year-old woman.

“We’re a family in ruin. We’re bro-

ken.”

Dominic Raab, the foreign sec-

retary, offered his condolences to

the victim’s family and released a

statement addressing the matter.

“I have called the U.S. ambassa-

dor to express the U.K.’s disap-

pointment with their decision, and

to urge the embassy to reconsider

it,” Mr. Raab said.

The United States Embassy

said that questions about immuni-

ty, which is rarely waived, were

discussed at senior levels and that

it was in close contact with the

British authorities.

After news of the woman’s flight

from Britain emerged, the news

media, the British government

and social media users stepped up

pressure on the American govern-

ment to reconsider her immunity.

“We have to get proper justice

for Harry and closure for his fam-

ily,” Andrea Leadsom, the secre-

tary of state for business, energy

and industrial strategy, wrote on

Twitter on Saturday.

“Harry & his family have been

wronged,” Angela Rayner, a mem-

ber of Parliament for the opposi-

tion Labour Party, said in a tweet.

The crash, the investigation and

Mr. Johnson’s identification of the

American woman could further

strain the so-called special rela-

tionship between the two coun-

tries, which has been tested nu-

merous times during Mr. Trump’s

presidency.

Mr. Trump has engaged in pub-

lic spats with Sadiq Khan, the

mayor of London, and endorsed

Mr. Johnson as a strong candidate

for prime minister while his pred-

ecessor, Theresa May, was still in

office. Kim Darroch, the British

ambassador to the United States,

resigned after leaked cables said

Mr. Trump was “radiating insecu-

rity” and his administration diplo-

matically “clumsy and inept.”

Still, Britain must walk a fine

line, most notably because it is

hoping to sign a trade deal with

the United States after it leaves

the European Union, a fraught

process that is complicated by the

fact that the Americans may make

demands the British find unac-

ceptable.

Robert Singh, a professor of

politics at Birkbeck, University of

London, who specializes in Ameri-

can foreign policy, said that he

could not recall a more serious im-

munity dispute between the two

countries.

He said in an email that al-

though the police could visit the

suspect in the United States, such

a visit would probably be of lim-

ited value. “This merely seems to

postpone the moment of reckon-

ing,” he said. “If she is indeed

guilty of the crime, as alleged,

then there will be immense pres-

sure upon the U.K. government to

initiate formal extradition pro-

ceedings — which, one would

imagine, any U.S. administration

(and this one, in particular) will

resist.”

The victim’s parents said that

they would continue fighting to

get justice for their son’s death.

“We are not going to be swept

under the carpet,” Ms. Charles

told ITV, a British news channel.

She added, “If that becomes his

legacy, then we are going to carry

on fighting, we’re not going to give

up, we’re not going to go away.”

“We can’t let our son die and

nothing be answered for,” said Tim

Dunn, his father.

Johnson Demands Return of U.S. Diplomat’s Wife

By ILIANA MAGRA

and MARK LANDLER

A memorial to Harry Dunn, 19, killed in August in Brackley, England, when his motorcycle col-

lided with a car that the prime minister said was driven by Anne Sacoolas, who has left the country.

PETER SUMMERS/GETTY IMAGES

Mr. Dunn

NAIROBI, Kenya — An Ameri-

can missionary who ran a conser-

vative evangelical church and ra-

dio station in Rwanda was ar-

rested in Kigali, the country’s cap-

ital, on Monday before he could

hold a news conference to de-

nounce the government for

clamping down on churches like

his.

The Rev. Gregg Schoof is one of

several evangelical pastors who

have criticized the Rwandan gov-

ernment for allowing access to

abortion and birth control, and for

teaching evolution. He was de-

tained for attempting to hold a

news conference without permis-

sion, said Modeste Mbabazi,

spokesman for the Rwanda Inves-

tigation Bureau.

Mr. Schoof moved his family to

Rwanda from Indiana 16 years

ago, nearly a decade after the

Rwandan genocide that killed as

many as one million people. He es-

tablished a Baptist church and

Amazing Grace Christian Radio.

But the government of President

Paul Kagame last year revoked

his station’s license and shut down

his church, and recently refused to

renew visas for Mr. Schoof and his

family, Mr. Schoof said.

“I did not come here to fight the

government. I came to preach the

Gospel,” Mr. Schoof said in a state-

ment he brought to what he had

billed as a final news conference.

“But this government has taken a

stand against God with its hea-

then practices.”

The Rwandan government has

been conducting a broad crack-

down on the country’s religious in-

stitutions, closing thousands of

churches and dozens of mosques,

often accusing them of failing to

comply with building safety

standards. Many of the shuttered

churches are small Pentecostal

groups that meet in tents or flimsy

buildings, and some preach a

brand of so-called prosperity

gospel that encourages wor-

shipers to donate beyond their

means.

Pastors who protested the clo-

sures have been arrested, and hu-

man rights advocates have ac-

cused Mr. Kagame of violating re-

ligious rights and free expression.

Rwanda’s telecommunications

regulator revoked the license of

Mr. Schoof’s radio station in 2018

after it had aired a sermon in

which a pastor was heard deni-

grating women, by calling them

evil, the regulator said. Rwanda

has exerted strong control over

the media since the 1994 genocide,

which was partly incited by in-

flammatory radio broadcasts.

Mr. Schoof took the matter to

court, but he said that the case has

not been heard. In his statement,

Mr. Schoof said that the pastor’s

sermon about “evil” women had

been taken out of context. He said

that the pastor had been preach-

ing about bad churches — not bad

women — and that the local news

media had parroted the govern-

ment’s mischaracterization.

On Monday, Mr. Schoof had

planned to give a news confer-

ence, issuing a news release say-

ing he would “update all about the

radio being closed, court cases,

and other things.” But the man-

ager of the bar where he planned

to speak asked him to show gov-

ernment authorization to hold the

meeting, and he did not provide it,

a police spokesman John Kabera

told a local newspaper, The New

Times.

Mr. Kabera said in an interview

with The New York Times that Mr.

Schoof “was arrested for disturb-

ing public order.”

Mr. Schoof could not be reached

for comment.

In the statement he was plan-

ning to read for the news media,

Mr. Schoof faulted the govern-

ment for closing churches and his

radio station, arresting pastors,

teaching evolution, allowing abor-

tion and distributing condoms to

young people.

He wrote, “Is this government

trying to send people to hell?”

Until last year, Rwanda impris-

oned women accused of having

abortions. But a law passed last

year allowed abortion in cases of

rape, forced marriage, incest, or

when the pregnancy posed a

health risk to the mother. Earlier

this year, Mr. Kagame ordered the

release of nearly 400 women and

girls who had been jailed for hav-

ing or aiding in abortions.

Mr. Schoof said he and his fam-

ily planned to move to Kampala,

Uganda, this month. On Monday

night, the minister was still in cus-

tody, the spokesman for the

Rwanda Investigation Bureau

said.

An American Missionary

Is Arrested in Rwanda

Was Set to Criticize Crackdown on Religion

By CARLOS MUREITHI