Sydney: Authorities and indigenous-rights protesters yesterday blamed each other for a heated clash in which bodyguards had to rush Prime Minister Julia Gillard out of an event marking the anniversary of British colonisation.
Gillard stumbled in Thursday's fray and lost a shoe, which protesters scooped up after the rowdy demonstration in the capital Canberra. Aboriginal-rights supporters had surrounded a restaurant and banged on its windows while Gillard and opposition leader Tony Abbott were inside at an award ceremony to mark Australia Day.
She's fine
Michael Outram, national manager of protection for the Australian Federal Police, said police may file charges against some of the protesters. Gillard said yesterday that she was fine, but slammed the activists' actions. "I've got no troubles at all with peaceful protests. ... What I utterly condemn is when protests turn violent the way we saw the violence yesterday, and particularly to disrupt an event which was to honour some extraordinary Australians," she said.
Protest leaders denied doing anything wrong, accused the police of manhandling protesters and said they planned to lodge a complaint against the officers involved.
"The Australian Federal Police came at us with force and we did not retaliate with force," protest spokeswoman Selina Daveys-Newry told reporters.
