Greta Thunberg arrested for blockading oil depot hours after court sentencing

Greta Thunberg has been fined for disobeying a police order to leave a climate protest in southern Sweden last month.

The 20-year-old climate activist denied the charge, telling the court on Monday "my actions are justifiable" - after she was arrested in June for blockading an oil facility.

The court in Malmö, the Swedish city where the protest was staged, found Thunberg guilty of and fined her 2,500 Swedish krona (£187).

However, the sentencing appeared to have little effect on the activists' determination, as just a few hours later she formed another roadblock at the same facility.

She was pictured being dragged away by police, after sitting down on the road and holding a sign saying, "I block tanker trucks".

At her hearing, Thunberg admitted to the facts but denied guilt, saying her fight against the fossil fuel industry was a form of self-defence due to the existential threat posed by climate change.

After the court rejected her argument and fined her, she told journalists: “We cannot save the world by playing by the rules,” vowing she would “definitely not” back down.

Local newspaper Sydsvenskan reported that Thunberg and other activists were detained after they stopped traffic in the oil terminal of a port in Malmö on June 19.

Thunberg and several other youth activists from the Reclaim the Future movement were charged for refusing to comply with police orders to leave the scene during the protest.

“If the court sees our actions of self-defense as a crime, that’s how it is,” said Irma Kjellström, a spokesperson for Reclaim the Future, who attended the protest.

She added that activists “have to be exactly where the harm is being done.”

Earlier this month she told CNN: “After having blocked the industry which is burning our future, we have now been charged with crime.

"While charges are being brought against us, the real crime continues inside the gates that we blocked”.

Thunberg inspired a global youth movement demanding stronger efforts to fight climate change after staging weekly protests outside the Swedish Parliament starting in 2018.

At the time of the Malmö port protest, which was organised by the activist group Ta Tillbaka Framtiden, Thunberg wrote on Instagram: "The climate crisis is already a matter of life and death for countless people.

"We choose to not be bystanders, and instead physically stop the fossil fuel infrastructure. We are reclaiming the future."

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