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* BlackRock targeted by Extinction Rebellion
* Activists say 2,799 people arrested globally in past week
* Reuters analysis finds index funds rarely act on climate
(Adds BlackRock declines to comment, details, global arrests)
By Guy Faulconbridge and Matthew Green
LONDON, Oct 14 (Reuters) - Climate activists targeted
BlackRock, the world's biggest asset manager, in London
on Monday, demanding that major financial institutions starve
fossil fuel companies of the money they need to build new mines,
wells and pipelines.
Extinction Rebellion, which uses civil disobedience to
highlight the risks posed by climate change and the accelerating
loss of plant and animal species, is midway through a new
two-week wave of actions in cities around the world.
Activists thronged the financial heart of London on Monday,
unfurling banners, addressing passersby by megaphone or blocking
streets around locations including BlackRock, the Bank of
England, Bank of China and Barclays.
At BlackRock, volunteers glued themselves to the doors while
others staged a mock dinner party with rolled-up banknotes on
their plates, a Reuters reporter said.
"The City of London is a preeminent nexus of power in the
global system that is killing our world," said Carolina Rosa,
spokesperson for Extinction Rebellion.
BlackRock declined to comment.
Extinction Rebellion wants to cause enough disruption to
force governments to rapidly cut carbon emissions and reverse
the collapse of ecosystems to avert the worst of the devastation
scientists project if business as usual continues.
Critics say the group is proposing what amounts to the
overthrow of capitalism without any clear idea of what would
replace it, and that the world's energy needs cannot be met
without fossil fuels.
Extinction Rebellion said that 1,336 people had been
arrested in London since it launched its actions a week ago. A
further 1,463 people have been arrested in 20 cities in
countries including the Netherlands, Belgium, the United States,
Australia, Canada and New Zealand.
"CRIMINAL DAMAGE"
While activists have long targeted fossil fuel companies, a
growing global climate protest movement is increasingly
scrutinising the role fund managers, banks and insurance
companies play in enabling oil and gas extraction.
Emily Grossman, a British science broadcaster and expert in
molecular biology who joined the protest outside BlackRock, said
that financing fossil fuel projects was undermining the goals of
the 2015 Paris Agreement to limit global warming.
"This is criminal damage that they are doing to our lives
and to the lives of our children and it has to stop," said
Grossman.
Major oil companies have approved $50 billion of projects
since last year that run contrary to the goals of the Paris
Agreement, according to an analysis published last month by
financial think-tank Carbon Tracker.
Fossil fuel companies say they need to invest in new
projects to meet future demand for energy, particularly in
fast-growing regions such as Asia.
Climate protesters want to pressure index fund firms such as
BlackRock because the sector, which now controls half the U.S.
stock mutual fund market, has enormous power to influence
companies in which they invest trillions of dollars.
The leading U.S. index fund firms, BlackRock, Vanguard Group
and State Street Corp, rarely use that clout, a Reuters analysis
of their shareholder-voting records found this month.
(Writing by Guy Faulconbridge and Matthew Green; additional
reporting by Simon Jessop; Editing by Michael Holden and Ed
Osmond)
