UPDATE 2-UK climate activist arrested after attacks on HSBC and Barclays

(Adds details on fraud allegation, recasts headline)

By Guy Faulconbridge

LONDON, May 11 (Reuters) - British climate activist Gail
Bradbrook, co-founder of the Extinction Rebellion group, was
arrested at home on Tuesday for conspiracy to cause criminal
damage and fraud after her group attacked banks such as HSBC
and Barclays.

Activists from the group smashed the window frontage of HSBC
and Barclays in Canary Wharf last month and have targeted
Lloyd's of London as part of what the activists cast as a "Money
Rebellion".

"Extinction Rebellion co-founder Gail Bradbrook was arrested
by officers from the Metropolitan Police at her home in Stroud
at around 5:30 am this morning for conspiracy to cause criminal
damage and fraud in relation to Money Rebellion's debt
disobedience," a spokeswoman for the group said.

The fraud allegation stems from a campaign to use personal
credit card debt to make donations to groups allegedly damaged
by banks - and then refusing to pay off the debt, a spokeswoman
said.

Bradbrook, 49, who has a PhD in molecular biophysics, says
Britain and other countries are acting far too slowly to stop
devastating climate change and that the Western financial system
is fuelling the abuse of the planet.

Extinction Rebellion wants to prompt a wider revolt against
the political, economic and social structures of the modern
world to avert the worst scenarios of devastation outlined by
scientists studying climate change.
(Reporting by Guy Faulconbridge, Editing by Paul Sandle and
Raissa Kasolowsky)