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Just Stop Oil campaigner slams restrictions on protesters' right to explain their actions
Just Stop Oil activists (left to right) Mary Somerville, Ludi Simpson and Phillipa Green leaving Westminster Magistrates' Court, central London, where they were charged with criminal damage, after soup was thrown at two Van Gogh paintings in the National Gallery, September 30, 2024

A JUST Stop Oil campaigner facing a potential prison sentence for throwing soup over Vincent van Gogh paintings has spoken out against court rulings limiting protesters’ rights to mount a defence of their actions.

Ludi Simpson, 71, from Bradford in West Yorkshire, was one of three Just Stop Oil campaigners arrested after throwing soup over glass covering van Gogh’s Sunflowers 1888 and Sunflowers 1889 in the Poets and Lovers exhibition at the National Gallery in London on September 27. 

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