Govt links Canada’s Covid protest to far-right groups

OTTAWA: Police in the Canadian capital Ottawa on Wednesday warned truck drivers blockading the downtown core to depart or face arrest in crackdown seeking to end a three-week-old protest over Covid restrictions.

Interim police chief Steve Bell vowed “to take back the entirety of the downtown core and every occupied space” in “coming days”. Meanwhile, federal public safety minister Marco Mendicino accused extremist groups of helping organise protests in Ottawa and at US border crossings and repeated suggestions that some actors wanted to overthrow the Liberal government.

Police handed leaflets to truckers that said, “You must leave the area now. Anyone blocking streets ... may be arrested.” Police also ticketed some of the hundreds of vehicles blocking Ottawa’s downtown.

In a video posted by CTV reporter Mackenzie Gray on Twitter, Tamara Lich, a prominent fundraiser for and organiser of the Ottawa protest, demanded an end to all state-ofemergency declarations, vaccine mandates and Covid restrictions

Mendicino said there were links between protesters in the capital and members of a farright organisation who were charged in an Alberta border blockade earlier in the week.

Police arrested 13 people in the blockade at the town of Coutts, Alberta and seized weapons. Four members of the group have been charged with conspiracy to commit murder.

“What we’re beginning to see emerge now are the hallmarks of a sophisticated and capable organisation of a small number of individuals... driven by an extreme ideology that would seek... to overthrow the existing government,” he said.

Mendicino spokesperson Alex Cohen said the minister was referring to the group Diagolon, which the Canadian Anti-Hate Network describes as a far-right network espousing conspiracy theories. A body armour vest seized by police in Coutts had a patch with Diagolon’s emblem.

“I hope he (Mendicino) was not referring to me or any of my friends because that would be extremely dangerous language,” Jeremy MacKenzie, the group’s de facto leader, told Reuters.

(Top) Patients displaying Covid-19 symptoms at a temporary triage area next to the emergency department at the Caritas Medical Center hospital; People queue at a makeshift Covid testing centre. Hong Kong’s Covid battle intensified on Thursday as authorities reported new cases had multiplied by 60 times so far this month and authorities are planning a testing blitz of the entire city. Hospitals are overwhelmed with some patients, including elderly, left lying on beds outside in chilly, sometimes rainy weather, in shocking scenes that prompted an apology from authorities in the Chinese controlled city.