Police in Melbourne fired pepper balls and rubber pellets on Tuesday to disperse about 2,000 protesters who defied stay-at-home orders to damage property, block a busy freeway and injure three officers, leading to more than 60 arrests.
In response, authorities have introduced ever-tougher restrictions, closing work site tea rooms, announcing mandatory vaccination for labourers and, most recently, closing almost all construction sites for two weeks.
For hours protesters opposing the measures confronted police, ignoring loudspeaker calls to leave and a final caution that “no further warnings will be given”.
Victoria state chief police commissioner Shane Patton said about 500 officers were responding to the “challenging” situation and had deployed pepper spray, foam baton rounds and rubber ball grenades. These crowd control equipment munitions were necessary, and they are necessary, because we can’t allow this type of conduct to go on,” he said.
“We will stop this protest. And we will then step back and investigate and hold those to account who need to be held to account. We’ve been clear: if you don’t follow the rules, we won’t hesitate to take action,” said state minister for industrial relations Tim Pallas, announcing the shutdown.
“We put the industry on notice just a week ago, we have seen appalling behaviour on site and on our streets, and now we’re acting decisively and without hesitation,” he said. Local construction union boss John Setka denounced the protesters, whom he said were hurting the entire workforce. The state of Victoria recorded 603 new Covid cases in the past 24 hours.
Australia’s two largest cities, Melbourne and Sydney, are currently in lockdown, as they race to vaccinate 80 percent of the population. That target would trigger gradual reopening, but remains at least a month away for most areas.
Source: Reteurs
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