All three climate activists who staged a protest action at the Mauritshuis Museum in the Hague (The Netherlands) last week have received a custodial sentence.
One of the defendants, Wouter Mouton, stuck his head to Johannes Vermeer’s painting “The Girl with the Pearl Earring”. A second defendant filmed the protest. They were both sentenced to two months in jail on Wednesday – though half the sentence is suspended - after the Dutch judge ruled that the destruction of the painting had been proved adding that the protest shocked many people.
On Friday David S, a 45-year-old from the East Flemish town of Dendermonde, also received a two-month prison sentence. Half the sentence is suspended. This defendant threw a tin of fake soup over fellow protester Wouter Mouton during his protest. David S. voiced the protest and stuck a hand to the panel on which the painting is attached.
Climate protesters Extinction Rebellion now intend to launch a wave of protests in Belgium and the Netherlands. “We’re doing this to protest against the fact that climate activists receive sentences that are out of proportion, while the real criminals run around free” the organisation said.
“The activists’ protest was provocative, but strictly without violence. In solidarity with the activists, the photographer and the thousands of activists, who are being suppressed across the globe, we will occupy public spaces. We won’t let judges, who don’t recognise civil disobedience, stop us”.