Two of the four extant original copies of the Magna Carta are housed at the British Library in London

Two Just Stop Oil protesters in their eighties have attempted to smash the glass around the Magna Carta in the British Library.

The pensioners hit the glass with a mallet and chisel and then glued their hands together.

There are four surviving copies of the Magna Carta, two of which are held at the British Library.

In a video posted by Just Stop Oil on X (formerly Twitter), two protesters use a chisel to break the glass encasing part of the Magna Carta.

One of the protesters says “This famous document is about the rule of law and standing up against the abuse of power.

“Our Government is breaking its own laws.”

As one of the protesters holds a banner saying “the Government is breaking the law”, a security guard asks them to “stop doing that please”.

The pair chant that the Government must “Just Stop Oil”.

In a statement, the British Library said: “The Library’s Security team intervened to prevent further damage to the case, which was minimal.”

“The police were notified and the Magna Carta itself remains undamaged. The Treasures Gallery is temporarily closed until further notice. ”

A Just Stop Oil spokesperson said: “Clause 39 of the Magna Carta is one of four clauses still enshrined in UK common law, a so-called ‘golden passage’, that states: ‘No free man is to be arrested, or imprisoned, or in any other way ruined, except by the lawful judgement of his peers or by the law of the land.”.

“Contrast that with civil law as it stands in 2024, where corporations are buying private laws in the form of injunctions that circumvent the people’s rights to a trial by jury for speaking out against the crimes of oil companies.”

 

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