Greta Thunberg has been detained by police twice on the same day in the Netherlands as officers removed protesters partially blocking a road in the Dutch city.
Miss Thunberg was seen flashing a victory sign as she sat in a bus used by police to take detained demonstrators from the scene of a protest in The Hague against Dutch subsidies and tax breaks to companies linked to fossil fuel industries on Saturday (April 6).
She told reporters: “We are in a planetary emergency and we are not going to stand by and let people lose their lives and livelihood and be forced to become climate refugees when we can do something.”
The Extinction Rebellion campaign group said before the demonstration that the activists would block a main route into The Hague.
However, a heavy police presence, including officers on horseback, prevented the activists from getting onto the road at first.
A small group of people, including Miss Thunberg, managed to sit down on another road and were detained after ignoring police orders to leave.
Extinction Rebellion activists have blocked the road that runs past the temporary home of the Dutch parliament more than 30 times to protest the subsidies.
The demonstrators waved flags and chanted: “We are unstoppable, another world is possible.” One held a banner reading: “This is a dead end street.”
In February, Miss Thunberg, 21, was acquitted by a court in London of refusing to follow a police order to leave a protest blocking the entrance to a major oil and gas industry conference in 2023.
Her activism has inspired a global youth movement demanding stronger efforts to fight climate change since she began staging weekly protests outside the Swedish parliament starting in 2018.
She has repeatedly been fined in Sweden and the UK for civil disobedience in connection with protests.
