George Clooney "didn't know" he wasn't allowed to "hang out" at the Sudanese Embassy.

The Ides of March actor was arrested for civil disobedience in Washington earlier today alongside his father Nick and other protesters after a demonstration outside the building aimed at drawing attention to the accusation that Sudan's president, Omar al-Bashir, is provoking a humanitarian crisis and blocking food and aid from entering the Nuba Mountains from South Sudan.

However, George has now been released after several hours and has since made light of the situations:

"It's on my permanent record. And you know that picture's going to be all over everything. Listen, what we've been trying to achieve today is we're trying to bring attention to an ongoing emergency. Our job right now is to try to bring attention to it, and one of those ways was, apparently, get arrested," he said, talking to reporters.

"I guess we're not allowed to hang out at the Sudanese Embassy, I didn't know that," his father interjected.

"I didn't know that either," George responded.

He added he was unsure what his arrest would mean, but hoped it brought people's attention to the plight of the tens of thousands of people without food in the African nation: "The real danger of course is there are people dying everyday there, tens of thousands of people are going to die of starvation. That's man-made. This isn't a famine, this is a man-made tragedy. You never know if you're going to accomplish anything, all we're trying to do is bring attention to a moment. We hope this brings attention to it."