Just Stop Oil protests took a shocking turn in London this morning after a 21-year-old activist was punched and kicked to the floor after the group blocked a Road in South Kensington ‘causing a pregnant woman to crash her car’.
The victim, Daniel Knorr, 21, a student from Oxford had previously gained notoriety after being carried off the pitch at Lords by England cricketer Johnny Bairstow.
In the graphic clip, a silver Mercedes can be seen pulled halfway across Cromwell Road in west London having apparently crashed.
A woman then leaves the car and screams ‘Stop now, I’m pregnant’, before another man gets out and angrily confronts the protesters, screaming: ‘Stop now, stop recording, you little s***.’
The man then appears to violently punch one activist in the face before stamping and kicking him while he lies prone on the ground.
A woman remonstrates with activists, explaining to them that she is pregnant
A furious man can then be seen leaving a stranded car and attacking an activist
The man punches an activist to the ground and kicks him
In response, Just Stop Oil said: ‘Daniel was assaulted while marching this morning, and remained nonviolent throughout. Disruption is difficult, but it’s necessary.’
Speaking after the assault, Mr Knorr said: ‘I haven’t said anything to the police and I don’t plan to, but I’m afraid that the police might go after this man.
I feel no ill sentiment or ill will against him. It’s a difficult situation for anyone to be in and it’s bound to create frustration.
‘I can tell with the fact that he’d just been in a car accident, he was very stressed.’
A witness to the incident told MailOnline: ‘The protest was just like so many others we’ve seen in London with a string of people in orange bibs blocking two lanes of the street and marching slowly.
‘The two lanes on the other side of the road weren’t blocked but were going slowly as people looked at what was happening. A silver car I think must have been trying to switch lanes and he got hit at low speed by a van behind them on its driver side.
‘A woman got out of the car and she was shouting at the protesters and then a man got out too and he just rushed over and started attacking the guy who seemed to be leading the Just Stop Oil group.
‘He punched him to the ground and then kicked him when it was on the ground. It was quite shockingly violent. It happened really quickly.
‘I’m not sure why they were so angry but I suspect they blamed the protest for causing the prang – and the one who got attacked had his own phone out so they may have thought he was filming them.
‘As I had been filming myself I didn’t want to stick around myself in case he turned on me so I didn’t see how it ended beyond the man in the red hat then talking to the van driver,, presumably to pass on insurance details.
‘The whole episode was insane.’
England cricket star Jonny Bairstow was hailed ‘a hero’ for carrying Daniel Knorr off the pitch at Lord’s last month
Police officers picked up Knorr and carried him away after Bairstow intervened
Daniel Knorr is led away from a Coventry museum by a police officer following the failed stunt to scale and cover ‘Dippy the Diplodocus’ with orange powder in April
Knorr lay motionless after being tackled by security guards, who were able to confiscate a rucksack filled with paint under Dippy in April
The group has so far targeted over five locations in the capital resulting in pedestrians pushing them into the road and Sky Sports’ Chris Kamara being delayed for a TV appearance.
The day began with activists targeting the Department for Energy Security for Net Zero with with orange fire extinguishers resulting in their arrests.
So far, the Metropolitan Police have been called to other events in the capital at Marylebone Road, Parliament Square, Westminster Bridge, Victoria Street and on Vauxhall Bridge Road – and in all cases police issued section 12 notices to demonstrators.
Amongst those caught in the traffic chaos was Sky Sports commentator Chris Kamara who tweeted: ‘Been stuck in traffic on the Vauxhall Bridge in London with the Oil Protesters doing their stuff. Missed my 9am call time.’
Elsewhere, a driver at the end of his tether was recorded pushing two activists into each other on a busy London road after the group deployed another slow march.
Two activists from the eco-zealot group were also seen dousing the government building in Whitehall with the orange spray as a protest against the government’s use of fossil fuels.
After their messy protest, the two demonstrators sat down in front of the paint splattered glass building and remained motionless.
In ugly scenes elsewhere in London a pedestrian was seen pushing protesters out of the road
The scuffle caused two protesters to topple over in the middle of the busy highway
Sky Sports’ Chris Kamara was caught up in Just Stop Oil chaos this morning
The pundit tweeted that due to the disruption he had missed his TV call time
Pictures then showed police officers swooping in to detain the two activists, who have been identified as Matthew Cunningham, 25, and Imogen May, 24.
In a short statement, the group said: ‘This morning, 2 supporters of Just Stop Oil have painted the department responsible for issuing over 100 new oil and gas licences in the UK.’
Energy Security Secretary Grant Shapps then accused Just Stop Oil protesters of ‘illegal criminal damage’
Mr Shapps, responding to questions about the paint protest on LBC during a round of broadcast interviews, said: ‘It is illegal criminal damage and I will leave that to the authorities.’
Mr Cunningham, in another video posted by JSO, said: ‘This department oversees our energy policy and we know from last month that the Climate Change Committee, the Government’s independent watchdog for climate change policy, denounced the Government’s efforts against climate change.
‘They said that they were far less sure that the Government would achieve net zero than it had been just one year ago.
‘And they specifically said that the Government needs to stop issuing new oil and gas licences because it is not compatible with a net zero future.’
Ms May said the department is ‘failing on their only purpose’ and that the climate situation is ‘getting really dangerous’.
Conservative Party chairman Greg Hands, posting a picture on social media of Westminster Bridge being blocked by JSO supporters, called the demonstration ‘unacceptable’.
