Anti-monarchy and climate change protesters arrested
Republican protesters with placards bearing “Not My King” slogans have been arrested ahead of the King’s Coronation.
Campaign group Republic said that Graham Smith, its chief executive, and five of his team have been arrested and “hundreds of placards” seized by the Metropolitan Police.
Videos were posted on social media of protesters in yellow being handcuffed and led into a waiting police van by officers.
In one video, an officer says: “I’m not going to get into a conversation about that - they are under arrest, end of.”
Less than an hour later, Republic re-tweeted a video of the protest at Trafalgar Square continuing, with people chanting “Not My King” and the message: “We will not be silenced.”
Republic asked on social media: “Is this democracy?
“Organisers of the #NotMyKing protest have been arrested - police won't say what for,” the group said. “So much for the right to peaceful protest”.
On Wednesday, the Metropolitan Police announced they would have an “extremely low threshold” for protests during the coronation celebrations, and that demonstrators could expect “swift action”.
After the apparent arrests, Republic activist Luke Whiting, 26, told Sky News: “We know that six of my colleagues and staff members, some of them volunteers, including the CEO of Republic, Graham Smith, have been arrested by the police.
“I know that what they were doing was they were bringing placards to our demonstration. We've been very open with the police about what we’re planning to do, it’s to hold a demonstration here in Trafalgar Square, so they were bringing placards and unloading them from a van and it seems they've been arrested using these new powers.
“It’s quite a worrying thing to happen - we’re pretty shocked actually, and quite surprised - like I said we’ve been quite open with the police about what we’re trying to do, they’ve said it’s perfectly legal for us to bring placards, bring flags down and protest the Coronation.
“In a democratic society, it’s absolutely our right to do this and to be peaceful, absolutely, and that’s what we’re here to do. We’ve not planned any disruption at all.”
One woman in a Republic T-shirt who was arrested also told PA: “We had a delivery of placards ready for the protest and then the tactical support unit questioned us as to how we had got through the road closures.
“They questioned whether what we were doing was a delivery.
“They then said they found evidence of means of locking on, of items that could be used to lock on, and they arrested us.”
Officers carried her away from where she had been standing outside a Tesco store. Two men who appeared to have been part of the same demonstration were carried away by officers into a marked police van.
Just Stop Oil protesters also appear to have been arrested at the Mall.
A large group from the campaign group were seen in handcuffs and police have cordoned the group off.
The policing operation is set to see 11,500 police officers on duty on Saturday.
The Met issued a statement that said: “A significant police operation is underway in central London. We have made a number of arrests in the area of Carlton House Terrace.
“The individuals have been held on suspicion of breaching the peace. Earlier today we arrested four people in the area of St Martin’s Lane.
“They were held on suspicion of conspiracy to cause a public nuisance.
“We seized lock-on devices. A further three people were arrested in the area of Wellington Arch.
“They were held on suspicion of possessing articles to cause criminal damage. There will be further updates later today.”
