About 10 people dressed in red and wearing masks, including one resembling an animal skull, were seen marching outside the High and District Court building in lower Stuart St before making their way to the Railway Station.
Climate Liberation Aotearoa support team member Rosemary Penwarden said they, along with Extinction Rebellion, were protesting today’s sentencing of a group of six environmental activists arrested in 2021 after blocking a coal train at the station.
The group were due to appear in the District Court at 2.15pm.
Mrs Penwarden said the ‘‘red rebels’’ were reminding New Zealanders that the world was in a climate emergency.
‘‘We have got so little time left in order to say what we can of a liveable future for our kids, and so they're just displaying the creatures that have already gone extinct and the fact that we are playing with death.
‘‘They signify death, they signify a hotter world, they signify the end of civilisation as we know it.’’
Protesters planned to be outside the courthouse when the sentencing was due to take place, and a Climate Liberation Aotearoa meeting was scheduled to be held at Knox Church at 6pm, she said.
