Protest leaders arrested in Ottawa in Canada police crackdown

Canadian police have arrested two protest leaders in Ottawa and threatened to break up a three-week protest against the country’s Covid restrictions.

Tamara Lich and Chris Barber were seized around Parliament Hill, just days after Canada invoked an emergency law for the first time.

Officers have continued negotiating with the remaining protesters and to try and persuade them to go home.

But interim Ottawa police chief Steve Bell warned: “If they do not peacefully leave, we have plans.

“We absolutely are committed to end this unlawful demonstration.”

Canada has been wracked by weeks of demonstrations and blockades that shut down border crossings into the US, inflicted economic damage on both countries and created a political crisis for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

They began with a truck convoy heading to Ottawa to oppose a vaccine mandate for truckers crossing the US-Canada border, but eventually became about a broader protest to pandemic restrictions and Mr Trudeau’s government.

Ottawa has become the movement’s last stronghold.

The Emergencies Act invoked by Mr Trudeau on Monday imposes bans on public assembly in some areas.

The demonstrators, many parked in some 400 trucks and other vehicles on streets around Parliament, have been warned they face arrest as well as having their trucks seized, their insurance suspended and bank accounts frozen.

But many of those in the self-styled Freedom Convoy appeared unmoved by the warnings.

“I’m prepared to sit on my ass and watch them hit me with pepper spray,” said one of their leaders, Pat King.

As for the trucks parked bumper-to-bumper, he said: “There’s no tow trucks in Canada that will touch them.”

The protests have shaken Canada’s reputation for civility and rule-following and inspired similar convoys in France, New Zealand and the Netherlands.