Reposted from CISA

This guide was created by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) to provide state, local, tribal, and territorial (SLTT) emergency managers with foundational knowledge of cyber incidents to increase cyber preparedness efforts in their jurisdictions. Planning Considerations for Cyber Incidents: Guidance for Emergency Managers provides recommendations on how to plan for and respond to cyber incidents.

Key aspects of cyber incident preparedness included in the document are:  

§    Understanding the types of cyber incidents likely to occur. 

§    Engaging service owners and operators. 

§    Identifying cyber dependent critical services and related dependencies.  

§    Prioritizing and planning for service and system disruptions. 

§    Identifying roles and responsibilities. 

§    Providing integrated communication and public messaging; and  

§    Developing a cyber incident response plan.  

During November, CISA will support several 60-minute FEMA-led webinar sessions that will provide an overview of the final guide and supporting materials.

Reposted from Observer

A work of art has been stolen from your home, and your first question likely has a lot to do with who might help you get it back. The police? The FBI? Your insurance carrier? Interpol? The Art Loss Register? A private detective? The answer is that all of these entities may eventually be involved in a search and recovery effort, but the very first step is contacting the group least likely to be effective: the local police. A note of caution: there is a “very low recovery rate” for stolen artworks, according to William Fleischer, president of Bernard Fleischer & Sons, an insurance brokerage firm in New York City. On the positive side, he told Observer, “art theft does happen, but not as often as one would think. Most claims involve breakage and fire, with a sprinkling of lost items in transit.” 

It’s a double-edged sword, in some respects. Your artworks are statistically unlikely to be stolen, which means that expertise in art recovery is relatively rare. Very few police officers have the knowledge or training to investigate stolen art, antiques and other collectibles, but having a police report is required for insurance claims or any involvement by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The FBI, which launched its National Stolen Art File app earlier this year, typically takes an interest only if the theft can be linked to organized crime, stolen artwork crosses state lines or a missing piece is worth more than $50,000. Local police departments “are not obligated to contact the FBI,” explains Robert Wittman, an art security consultant in Chester Heights, Pennsylvania who was formerly an FBI agent specializing in art theft cases. He added that it would be the FBI that contacts Interpol, the European organization that works with law enforcement agencies around the world to combat various types of crimes, including art theft. 

However, the victims of art theft can contact the London-based Art Loss Register themselves to report missing artwork by submitting information like size, title, name of artist, price information and photographs. The Art Loss Register doesn’t pursue criminals but does maintain the world’s largest database of artworks reported stolen, and that database is regularly checked by collectors, art dealers, auction houses, insurance companies and law enforcement agencies when an object is offered up for sale. The Art Loss Register’s database was created in the 1970s by the International Foundation for Art Research (IFAR), which is located in Manhattan. IFAR licenses its database to the ALR, but it continues to publish lists and images of stolen, recovered and looted art in each issue of its IFAR Journal and also organizes programs and publishes articles about art theft and looting. Wittman also recommended that victims of art theft should reach out to the galleries where artworks were purchased—particularly if a gallery specializes in that type of art or works by the artist. “They are likely to be aware if these kinds of pieces show up somewhere,” he explained. Still, don’t hold your breath. The police and the FBI have other, more consequential crimes to solve. “A month after contacting the police, you might want to reach out to an art detective,” Wittman said. “We do the stuff that the police won’t do.” What that ‘stuff’ is doesn’t sound very cloak-and-dagger. Private art detectives contact dealers and auction houses that sell the type of material that was stolen; they check lists of stolen cultural property; and then they wait for something to turn up. It likely comes as no surprise that Wittman’s principal business is helping homeowners and museums proactively secure their premises so that art theft doesn’t happen in the first place. Arthur Brand, a Dutch art crime investigator, noted that he is usually contacted by victims anywhere between two and forty years after a theft occurred, and one of the first steps he takes is to “ask permission from the police” to launch an investigation. “You don’t want to mess around with an active police investigation, so I take the job after it has gone cold,” he told Observer. Treating recovery work as a side gig seems to be the norm in the art theft world, and Brand’s case is no exception. He has tracked down stolen artworks by Van Gogh, Picasso and Salvador Dali, as well as culturally relevant objects, only getting a fee when a recovery is made. “In eighty percent of cases, I don’t get paid,” he revealed, adding that about half his work involves helping people buy and sell artworks—legitimately, of course. 

There is no association of private art investigators, and victims of art theft often have to rely on search engine results to find someone who can help. The head of one New Paltz, New York, private investigation firm who asked not to be identified noted that “for a variety of reasons, law enforcement officers may be unable or reluctant to refer victims to service providers in the private sector,” although he thought that the NYPD or FBI might recommend contacting a retired detective or special agent who works in private practice. Additionally, lawyers who specialize in fine art matters “might be able to recommend an investigator.” Contrary to how Brand operates, private investigators generally work on a retainer basis, charging by the hour, and fees for billable hours and expenses rack up regardless of the outcome of an investigation. While most art is stolen from museums, rather than from private homes, private art collectors shouldn’t be complacent. In January of 2023, six people were arrested for the 2012 theft of a Porsche, several bottles of wine, designer wristwatches and artworks including paintings by Jasper Johns, Piet Mondrian, Frank Stella, Franz Kline and Philip Guston from the Los Angeles home of financier Jeffrey Gundlach the paintings were recovered in two weeks from an automobile stereo shop in Pasadena. Gundlach had offered a reward of up to $1.7 million for the return of his artworks, which proved helpful in tracking down the paintings. 

Claire Marmion, an art consultant for the insurance industry and founder of the Haven Art Group, noted that both homeowners and insurance carriers offer rewards for the safe return of stolen artworks, although her experience is that rewards are “helpful in catching the perpetrators, less helpful in recovering the art.” In terms of whether or not to offer a reward, Steven Pincus, senior managing director of Risk Strategies, an insurance brokerage firm based in Boston, Massachusetts, suggested that “this should be guided by the insurance company in connection with law enforcement.” The amount of the reward generally reflects a percentage of the value of missing art but could be considerably higher if the piece has significant personal or sentimental value to its owner. The amount of insured loss is also a factor. In 2006, a 1778 painting by Francisco de Goya that was stolen from a fine art transporter van carrying it from a museum in Toledo, Ohio to the Guggenheim Museum in New York City was recovered, in no small part thanks to the $50,000 reward offered by the insurance company whose policy covered the artwork. A lawyer for the thief contacted authorities, who took possession of the unharmed artwork in time for its exhibition. As Arthur Brand said, “Money talks.”

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Reposted from WHYY

Since January 2020, the Iron Hill Museum in Delaware has grappled with persistent vandalism. In the first week of October, the situation escalated when racial slurs were graffitied at the institution near Newark, prompting heightened security concerns. It’s the second incident of damage at the museum’s property this year. Back in March, small information signs were broken or went missing, trails were littered with trash, a storage shed was broken into, and cameras were stolen. Robin Broomall is president of the board of directors at the Delaware Academy of Science, which operates the museum. She said there’s a common thread across multiple incidents. “We’ve had ongoing vandalism for almost four years now. We really feel that it is the same person or persons doing this because their modus operandi always seems to be about the same: cause as much damage to the organization as they can,” Broomall said. “We’ve seen how they operate [by] throwing things around in the woods, damaging information signs. It always seems to be just about the same way.” At the beginning of this year, the museum used a $25,000 grant to create a new trail dedicated to the history of the free Black community in the area — but once again, it was vandalized. “In February of this past year, we had an African American History Trail put in with about 15 informational signs, and the ribbon cutting ceremony for that was at the end of February,” she said. “Less than two weeks later, every one of those informational signs was ripped out of the ground, broken, or totally destroyed.” Following the trail incident, the museum upgraded its security cameras, but they were unsuccessful in capturing the person responsible for the most recent act of vandalism. 

This time, vandalism involved racial graffiti slurs across ten different informational signs. “We had ten education informational signs across our property that were all scribbled with black marker and the n-word was large and prevalent over all of those signs,” she said. “This is kind of taking things to a more disgusting level.” All of this occurred on the night of Oct. 4. Broomall was meeting with a security installer when she discovered the multiple racial slurs. “It’s also disheartening. I myself have had a lot of time spent on you know, helping to clean up. We have a volunteer who went around and spent almost an entire day working on cleaning off these signs,” she said, adding that was time wasted which could have been used for community engagement and programming. Iron Hill has been in close collaboration with local and state NAACP organizations since the March vandalism. They hold monthly meetings dedicated to finding ways to protect the museum and its African American history, with the active participation of state and local police. After hearing of the latest incident, Broomall said one NAACP member “was most adamant that they want to be involved in developing a ‘friends of Iron Hill Museum organization’ to pull some other community members into it.” While museum supporters could easily label the vandalism a hate crime, Broomall stressed the need to confirm who is damaging their property and what their objective is. She said the years of vandalism might be more about a vendetta against the museum than racial resentment. 

Regardless of the motivation, Broomall said the museum will not be deterred. “I want to say that we are not going to be dismayed. We’re not going to hold back any longer with our purpose of educating the community on the history of the Iron Hill region,” she said. “We’re moving forward. We are going to be putting that African American History Trail back into place. We’re not going to let one individual hold us from doing what our mission says.” This summer, Iron Hill received a grant from the State of Delaware. That money will help pay to upgrade the security system, rebuild the African American trail, and replace a damaged fence.

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Reposted from NL Times

Dutch King Willem-Alexander and Queen Máxima were forced to quickly get to their car after encountering an angry crowd of demonstrators on Friday during a visit to a museum for the history of slavery in Cape Town, South Africa. The atmosphere was grim, where the demonstrators left little room for the couple, and the security guards had to intervene forcefully. The couple managed to leave for their next appearance without injury.

The group of people gathered at the Iziko Slave Lodge to draw attention to the role of the Netherlands in South Africa’s historical ties to slavery. Dozens of protesters descended on the couple as they exited the museum. Along the way, a native bow was placed in the king’s hands.

A tricky moment came when Máxima had to walk around the car to her side. The Dutch and South African security guards had to push the protesters aside at that moment. The queen was then pulled through the crowd by security guards.

The atmosphere was initially friendly, but that gradually changed. The demonstrators were identified as being Khoisan, the indigenous people of South Africa. In addition to Willem-Alexander’s apologies for the Dutch past history of slavery, they also want to see action, they said. At the beginning of the visit, the couple spoke with the demonstrators outside when there were only a few of them.

The royal couple spent quite some speaking with those present. The atmosphere was positive at that moment; people spoke with each other seriously, but also laughed together. The demonstrators wanted to know from the royal couple when action will be taken, now that an apology has been issued. After the conversation, the royal couple invited some of the demonstrators to join them when they entered the museum.

But outside, the crowd soon swelled to over a hundred, many of whom expressed anger in front of the doors of the slavery museum. As a precaution, the gates to the museum were closed. The security guards stationed at the doors were booed, especially the guards who are South African.

The demonstrators questioned how the guards could put on a nice suit and “join” the Dutch. A museum employee tried to calm the situation, saying that the royal couple learned more about “the terrible history” inside, but the fuss only grew.

Protest signs were waved, and people also sang songs. The signs contained texts, like, “You are stealing our culture,” “We were the first,” “We want compensation,” and “You are forgetting us.”

On July 1, the king apologized on behalf of the Netherlands for the Dutch history of slavery during a speech in Amsterdam. “Today I stand before you. Today, as your King and as a member of the government, I make this apology myself. And I feel the weight of the words in my heart and my soul,” Willem-Alexander said during Keti Koti, the national commemoration for the end of slavery.

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said in a press statement on Thursday that he acknowledges the king’s apology. “This was an important step towards reconciliation, repair and healing of old wounds.

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Reposted from NYtimes

The Berlin institution with a spectacular, but disputed, centerpiece
closes next week for a refurbishment that won’t be complete until 2037.Even wrapped in plastic, the Pergamon Altar is a striking sight. A
monumental structure with ornate friezes depicting a battle between giants
and gods, it was sculpted in what is now Turkey in the 2nd century B.C. and
is one of the most imposing known examples of antique art. Housed in
Berlin’s Pergamon Museum for over a century, the altar has long been one of
the main attractions in the German capital.
That is, when visitors can see it. The altar has been inaccessible since
2014, amid construction work on the museum’s north wing. On Oct. 23, the
rest of the museum — one of the most visited in Germany — will close for
four years. Although the altar room and north wing are set to reopen in
2027, other parts of the building will not be accessible for a further
decade.
 
The project comes at a delicate time. In recent years, European
institutions exhibiting archaeological objects from other parts of the
world, such as the Pergamon Museum, and the British Museum, in Londonhave faced increased scrutiny over the provenance of their exhibits. With
more than $1.5 billion of public money being invested into the Pergamon
Museum refurbishment, its leaders now face new calls to justify their work.
“The institution of the museum, as a product of the Enlightenment, is being
questioned,” Andreas Scholl, the director of the Pergamon’s antiquities
collection said during a recent tour of the site. “Nobody knows how the
debate will progress.”
The Pergamon Museum’s administrators, however, are betting that much will
remain the same in the next 14 years. In addition to structural work, the
renovations will add new spaces for exhibits and visitors, and update
infrastructure, lighting and climate control. But, as Scholl put it, “The
fundamental concept isn’t changing.”
“The institution of the museum, as a product of the Enlightenment, is being
questioned,” said Andreas Scholl, the head of the Pergamon Museum’s
antiquities collection.Credit...Lena Mucha for The New York Times
Opened in 1930 on Museum Island, in central Berlin, the building was
custom-designed to showcase the altar and several other spectacular items
of antique architecture, including parts of the so-called Ishtar Gate from
the ancient city of BabylonBut the building was built on oak pylons driven into unstable, sandy
ground, and Jens Küchler, the project manager in charge of the renovations,
said renewing its foundations was crucial for long-term stability. The
work, he said, is partly focused on a metal underground structure
stretching across the island that “holds up the building.” The Pergamon Altar has always been the museum’s most prized attraction.
Discovered in the 1870s by Carl Humann, a German engineer, its transfer to
Berlin was made possible by a series of agreements between Ottoman Empire
administrators and German officials that allowed Germany to retain a
portion of the artifacts that Humann and his collaborators discovered.

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Reposted from Ekathimerini

Five people on Crete are facing charges related to making up to €6 million by selling forged art works, attributed to well-known artists, to private individuals, collectors and auction houses overseas, following an investigation by police. The investigation of the five followed an incident in Sofia, Bulgaria, in February when authorities prevented the sale of a fake painting for €12 million. In searches that followed in houses and a warehouse in Attica, 10 paintings, seals, documents, certificates of authenticity and a metal oven for aging art works were found and confiscated. Experts deemed the paintings found in Attica to be entirely forged. The subsequent investigation found that the gang selling the paintings had been operational since at least 2014. The alleged members of the forgery gang range in age from 35 to 69 years.

Reposted from BBC

Staff at the Royal Lancers & Nottinghamshire Yeomanry Museum noticed a number of items were missing when they arrived at work on Sunday. A search then revealed a hole had been drilled up through an archway to allow the thieves to reach into a display cabinet. Detectives described the raid as "audacious" and "well organized". Among the items stolen from the museum, in Thoresby Park near Ollerton, are a distinctive parcel and gilt rosewater dish - said to be the sister piece to the Wimbledon women's singles trophy. 

The Hurlingham Grand Military Polo trophy, statuettes of mounted soldiers and a cavalry trumpet were also taken. Nottinghamshire Police believe the burglary happened between 02:40 and 03:30 GMT on Sunday. Officers believe a small hole was drilled so a camera could be used to survey the display before a larger 25cm (10in) by 30cm (12in) hole was cut through the wooden floor and cabinet.

 Museum curator Steve Cox said: "It's disgusting that they've taken history from the people who have served and fought for this country. "The items they have taken are priceless to the museum. How do you put a value on history? "We're upset about it, but we're fighting back and we're going to rebuild from what's gone." Det Insp Luke Todd, of Nottinghamshire Police, said: "This was an audacious, planned, and targeted attack on what is a wonderful historic building and was clearly very well organised. "The items that were stolen are not only high in monetary value but also high in sentimental value not only to the military, but also to the wider community in the area. "These items are worth so much more to the museum than they are melted down in their silver form." He urged anyone with information about the theft, or who becomes aware of attempts to sell the antiques, to contact police. The museum, which also contains a range of firearms and other weapons, has checked its collection and accounted for all other items.

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Reposted from NYTimes

Several museums and collectors have surrendered artworks by Egon Schiele
to investigators who say they were looted. But others are asserting that
the evidence is inconclusive.For decades, several important museums and collectors ignored suggestions
that the works they owned by the Austrian master Egon Schiele had been
stolen by the Nazis from a Viennese cabaret performer, Fritz Grünbaum.
 
Instead, many embraced an alternative account told by a Swiss gallerist. He
said that in 1956, 15 years after Grünbaum’s death in the Dachau
concentration camp, he had come into possession of dozens of Grünbaum’s
Schieles.
The gallerist, Eberhard Kornfeld, said Grünbaum’s sister-in-law had
approached him, looking to sell a bunch of the Schiele artworks. Kornfeld
said he bought most of the 81 Grünbaum Schieles from her and put 65 of them
up for sale, an event that eventually led to more sales and resales and
caused the Grünbaum Schieles to end up in collections around the world.
But a New York civil court ruling several years ago and, more recently, the
findings of investigators working for the Manhattan District Attorney have
undermined the credibility of Kornfeld ’s account. The New York civil court
held that Grünbaum never willingly soldor
surrendered any of his works. In recent weeks the New York City prosecutors
were able to persuade several museums and collectors to surrender nine
Schiele works, valued at more than $10 million, to Grünbaum’s heirs.
 
Now the heirs, Timothy Reif, David Fraenkel and Milos Vavra, are pursuing
legal claims in New York that seek the return of 13 additional works by
Schiele held by three museums, the Albertina and the Leopold in Austria,
and the Art Institute of Chicago. The heirs argue in court papers that
these works, which include a well-known painting, “Dead City III,” held by
the Leopold, were also stolen from Grünbaum and were never in the
possession of his sister-in-law, Mathilde Lukacs.
Raymond Dowd, the heir’s lawyer, wrote in a federal suit filed in December
against the two Austrian museums that the Lukacs story has long been
derided by Holocaust scholars “as implausible because Lukacs was herself
imprisoned in Belgium during World War II after escaping Vienna.”
Kornfeld’s account was first publicly aired in 1998 when “Dead City III,” a
moody 1911 portrait of the Czech town of Cesky Krumlov where Schiele lived
in 1910, was briefly seized as looted in New York by then Manhattan
District Attorney Robert Morgenthau. The work was ultimately returned to
the Leopold museum in Austria.
Grünbaum was taken away by the Nazis, but some holders of art work he once
owned do not agree that his collection was also confiscated.Credit...Getty
Images William Charron, the lawyer who represents the Leopold Museum, declined to be interviewed. But in its court filings, the museum has argued that the plaintiffs are too late in making their claim and that the federal court in
Manhattan where the heirs filed their lawsuits does not have jurisdiction.
 
The museum said in its legal filing that it is also relying on a federal
court decision in which the judge ruled against the Grünbaum heirs in a
dispute over another Schiele. That judge found that the lawsuit was also
filed too late and that documents provided by Kornfeld supported his
account of having bought the works from the sister-in-law, Lukacs. (The
heirs have challenged the authenticity of those documents, which include a
receipt said to have been signed by Lukacs.)
The Art Institute of Chicago, which holds the Schiele drawing “Russian
Prisoner of War,” and is being sued separately by the Grünbaum heirs, has
also argued that the claim is time-barred and that the earlier federal case
decided that the Nazis had never seized the collection. The drawing in
Chicago is also the subject of a seizure order by the Manhattan district
attorney’s office, which the museum is contesting. The Art Institute has
countersued the Grünbaum heirs for “a declaration of title” to the artwork.
Spokesmen for the Leopold and Albertina museums, which are owned by the
government of Austria, declined to comment, citing the pending litigation.
A spokesman for the Art Institute wrote in an email, “We are confident in
our legal acquisition and lawful possession of this work.”
 
So far, Reif, a judge on the U.S. Court of International Trade, and
Fraenkel, a former commercial banker, have secured the return of more than
a dozen Schieles they argue were taken from Grünbaum. (Vavra is retired and
lives in the Czech Republic.)
The return of seven Schieles was announced in late September by
Alvin Bragg, the Manhattan District Attorney, whose office convinced three
museums and two collectors to surrender the works. The Museum of Modern Art and the Morgan Library in New York were among the group that returned
works, as was the art collector and former U.S. ambassador to Austria,
Ronald Lauder. He gave back a watercolor, “I Love Antithesis,” a
self-portrait of the artist created in 1912. In an interview, Reif said the seven Schieles will be sold by Christie’s, in two sales this month, with the proceeds going to the Grünbaum Fischer Foundation, which supports underrepresented artists. More recently, three additional institutions, the Carnegie Museums, in
Pittsburgh; the Allen Memorial Art Museum, at Oberlin College; and the
Vally Sabarsky Trust in New York have agreed to surrender Schiele artworks formerly owned by Grünbaum.
 
Grünbaum assembled his collection of Schiele after the artist’s death in
1918 from the Spanish flu. The New York investigators have agreed with the
plaintiffs that Grünbaum’s wife was forced to turn over his art collection
to Nazi officials when her husband was imprisoned in 1938. Investigators
say there is evidence that the Nazis, who viewed Schiele’s work as
degenerate and thus disposable, put it in a warehouse in Austria. The
investigators have not addressed specifically how they believe Kornfeld
obtained the Schieles, if not from Lukacs. But in a press statement they
pointed to a longstanding business relationship Kornfeld had with the son
of the art dealer Hildebrand Gurlittwhom the Nazis assigned the task of selling off “degenerate art.” Kornfeld, however, has said that, instead of being diffused in multiple sales, that most of the Grünbaum Schieles were maintained as a collection, one ultimately held by Grünbaum ’s sister-in-law who was herself persecuted by the Nazis and fled Vienna for Brussels in 1941. By Kornfeld’s account, the Schiele works escaped with her.

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Reposted from ARTnews

A Russian airstrike on the strategic Black Sea port of Odesa wounded at least eight people on Sunday night and damaged one of the city’s major art institutions, Odesa officials reported.

According to a statement from Ukraine’s Interior Ministry, a missile launched by Russia caused significant damage to the Odesa Fine Arts Museum, one of the most important Tsarist-era palaces in Odesa’s historic city center. 

“On November 6, the Odesa National Art Museum turns 124 years old,” Andriy Yermak, head of the office of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said in a statement.” On the eve of Nov. 6, the Russians ‘congratulated’ our architectural monument with a missile that hit nearby.”

A video posted by the Odesa city council to social media showed shattered windows and a ruined interior of the once-stately structure; outside, workers assess craters gouged in the streets by the air strikes. The city’s port infrastructure also took damage, with strategic warehouses and vehicles carrying grain set on fire.

Odesa, a centuries-old crossroads for European and Asian cultures and cherished for its architectural landmarks, including the Odesa Opera House and the 19th century Tolstoy Palace, has been the target of Russian bombing since its invasion of Ukraine began in 2022. That July, an aerial assault on the city resulted in the destruction of part of the Odesa Museum of Modern Art and Odesa Museum of Fine Arts. UNESCO condemned the destruction “in the strongest terms” and has funded repairs to both museums and financed efforts to digitize artworks and provide protective equipment.

The historic center of the city was declared an endangered World Heritage Site earlier this year following a formal appeal from Zelenskyy to the United Nations.

The Odesa Museum of Fine Arts housed more than 12,000 works before the war, but nearly the whole collection was transported for safekeeping by the museum employees in February 2022.

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Reposted from BBC

Two Just Stop Oil protesters have been arrested after glass protecting the Rokeby Venus painting at the National Gallery in London was smashed. The Met Police said two activists had been arrested on suspicion of causing criminal damage. Just Stop Oil named the pair as Hanan, 22, and Harrison, 20, and said safety hammers were used to smash the glass. Meanwhile, police said about 100 Just Stop Oil protesters were arrested after slow marching in the road at Whitehall. The vandalized artwork, by Diego Velazquez in the 1600s, was previously slashed by suffragette Mary Richardson in 1914.

Following the latest incident, Just Stop Oil (JSO) said: "Women did not get the vote by voting, it is time for deeds not words. It is time to Just Stop Oil. Politics is failing us. It failed women in 1914 and it is failing us now. New oil and gas will kill millions. If we love art, if we love life, if we love our families we must Just Stop Oil." There had been reports that activists had targeted the Cenotaph memorial - action that has been criticized by MPs and the mayor - but the group and the police have denied these claims. Sadiq Khan and Labour's shadow home secretary, Yvette Cooper, both said that targeting the monument was "unacceptable" in X posts now deleted. Tory party deputy chairman Lee Anderson said that JSO were "now stuck to the Cenotaph" as he shared a picture on social media site X. 

The activists said they had been moved to the base of the monument after shutting down traffic on Whitehall, an account supported by one officer at the scene. The Met Police confirmed that there were no offences linked to the Cenotaph and no protester glued themselves to the road. They added that the arrests were made for breaching section 7 of the Public Order Act at various points between Trafalgar Square, Parliament Square and near to the Cenotaph. Protesters failing to engage with officers can be arrested under section seven of the Public Order Act introduced this year. It states that an arrest can be made if their actions "interfere with the use or operation of any key national infrastructure in England and Wales". 

The government said the new measures would not ban protests, but "only prevent a small minority of individuals from causing serious disruption to the daily lives of the public". Human rights group Liberty responded to the arrests, saying: "The use of this new power is a dangerous escalation of the attack on the right to protest, with protesters potentially facing up to a year in prison for standing up for what they believe in. "These arrests are a clear attempt to criminalize people for exercising that right. The government, in passing these new laws, has tried to make it even harder for the public to stand up to power." A series of Just Stop Oil protests have taken place in recent days, including on Wednesday when more than 30 people were charged after blocking Earl's Court Road.

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