{"id":252237,"date":"2026-01-26T08:53:06","date_gmt":"2026-01-26T08:53:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/252237\/"},"modified":"2026-01-26T08:53:06","modified_gmt":"2026-01-26T08:53:06","slug":"invasion-day-police-clear-perth-protest-site-amid-reports-of-threat-as-huge-marches-held-across-australia-indigenous-australians","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/252237\/","title":{"rendered":"Invasion Day: police clear Perth protest site amid reports of \u2018threat\u2019 as huge marches held across Australia | Indigenous Australians"},"content":{"rendered":"

Police in Western Australia<\/a> have shut down the location of a planned Invasion Day rally after receiving reports of a threat targeting the Perth CBD.<\/p>\n

WA police issued a warning on Monday afternoon urging the public to stay away from the area and await further advice, saying they had deployed \u201csignificant police resources\u201d to and set up an exclusion zone around Forrest Place. One person was in custody, police said.<\/p>\n

One attendee, Jade Cameron, told Guardian Australia that it was \u201cchaos\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey [police] tried to get the elders and everyone from going into Forrest Chase but we didn\u2019t know why, they refused to let us have our usual ceremony,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are deciding to push on and do circles all through the street, [but] we managed to get the elders away and safe and proceed.\u201d<\/p>\n

It comes as Invasion Day protests wrapped up in the eastern states, with tens of thousands of people marching. Police interrupted clashes between the large crowds and a scattering of anti-immigration protesters in Melbourne<\/a>, Sydney, Canberra and Brisbane.<\/p>\n

The crowd sits down in front of the Downing Centre courts during the rally in Sydney. Photograph: Jessica Hromas\/The Guardian<\/p>\n

In Melbourne, about two dozen of the more than 500 people who attended the March for Australia anti-immigration rally, which was scheduled for the same time as the 30,000-strong Invasion Day rally, clashed with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander protesters and allies as the larger march was making its way down Bourke Street.<\/p>\n

Police in riot gear and mounted police were concentrated on the March for Australia rally but interrupted four altercations between the two groups, involving between two and 10 anti-immigration protesters.<\/p>\n

In Sydney, organisers began by paying respect to the families of expectant mother Sophie Quinn, her partner John Harris, and her aunt Nerida, who were killed in the far west New South Wales town of Lake Cargelligo on Friday<\/a>, allegedly by Quinn\u2019s estranged former partner.<\/p>\n

Sydney\u2019s Invasion Day rally moving along Elizabeth Street. Photograph: Jessica Hromas\/The Guardian<\/p>\n

Speaking alongside people holding photos of the three victims, Paul Silva, a Dunghutti man, said Quinn was \u201cbeautiful young woman with a gentle and kind nature\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe was loving, looking forward to becoming a mum for her first time, her baby boy never got a chance to make it by her side,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Police only confirmed six days ago that participants in the NSW march would not face the risk of arrest. Anti-protest measures, introduced in the wake of the Bondi terror attack, were scaled back to focus on the eastern suburbs and exclude the planned protest route from Hyde park to Victoria<\/a> park.<\/p>\n

Silva, a Dunghutti man, is the nephew of David Dungay Jr, who died in custody in 2015. Earlier, he promised to march even if the anti-protest laws weren\u2019t lifted.<\/a><\/p>\n

Paul Silva\u2019s son leading the chants at Sydney\u2019s Invasion Day rally. Photograph: Jessica Hromas\/The Guardian<\/p>\n

Silva, whose son gave the acknowledgement of country, said Invasion Day marches were about educating \u201cour emerging next generation to ensure that they continue to fight\u201d.<\/p>\n

One speaker at the rally criticised the Minns government for \u201csilencing protests\u201d in the wake of the Bondi terror attack, saying: \u201cI send my love and condolences to the families of that terrible attack, but it\u2019s just as important that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples get the same respect and recognition\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Minns government has given the New South Wales<\/a> Police more authority to try and stop our rallies, which creates more opportunities to try and brutalise us.<\/p>\n

\u201cAlways was, always will be, Long live our resistance along with the Intifada.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some participants carried Palestinian flags, while others carried the Aboriginal flag and even Irish flags.<\/p>\n

A NSW parliamentary inquiry is investigating whether to ban the phrase \u201cglobalise the intifada\u201d.<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2018We are here because truth matters\u2019<\/p>\n

Organisers of the Melbourne rally won a federal court case against Victoria police on Friday against stop and search laws in the CBD.<\/p>\n

At the Melbourne rally, Arrernte woman Celeste Liddle read a statement on behalf of the organising body Warriors for Aboriginal Resistance, saying the crowd walked \u201cin the footsteps of those Aboriginal activists, who, 88 years ago to this day, walked through Sydney<\/a> on what was the first Day of Mourning protest\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are here because many decades down the track, most of their demands in their revolution on that day, which included full equality, recognition of our cultural rights and the end to the brutalisation of our people remain unanswered,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

The crowd at the Invasion Day rally in Melbourne on Monday. Photograph: Jesse Thompson\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Travis Lovett, a former deputy commissioner of the Yoorook Justice Commission, called for a national truth-telling commission \u2013 which was promised as one part of the commitment to the Uluru statement for the heart. Support for the proposed body has cooled since the failed voice to Parliament referendum in 2023.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are here because truth matters, we are here because listening matters, we are here because this country cannot heal unless it faces its history honestly,\u201d Lovett said.<\/p>\n

In Canberra<\/a>, the Invasion Day march went past a group of 40 March for Australia protesters dressed in Australian flags on the lawns of Old Parliament House.<\/p>\n

Organisers urged people attending the rally not to engage with those protesters.<\/p>\n

Invasion Day protesters march past Parliament House in Canberra. Photograph: Hilary Wardhaugh\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

A line of federal police separated the two groups, with some of the anti-immigration attendees appearing to confront those in the rally as they walked past, including shouting at a mother with two young children.<\/p>\n

Speaking at the Canberra rally, Butchulla woman Wendy Brookman says that education is key to ensuring Australia\u2019s violent past is acknowledged.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou cannot heal a wound, you refuse to look at,\u201d she said. \u201cI don\u2019t accept the nation that celebrates while First Nations people grieve. I don\u2019t accept being told to get over it while the consequences are still being lived.\u201d<\/p>\n

There was also a minor confrontation between Invasion day protests and a man draped in an Australian flag in Brisbane, where speakers addressed a crowd of several thousand people and called for a royal commission into racism against Indigenous people \u2013 likening it to the royal commission on antisemitism after the Bondi terror attack.<\/a><\/p>\n

Speaker Dale Ruska said racism had been normalised against First Nations people.<\/p>\n

\u201cAustralia is an historical crime scene. It is an historical crime scene, and it is worth the same sort of effort that the people that suffered Bondi are given,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Police in Western Australia have shut down the location of a planned Invasion Day rally after receiving reports…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":252238,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":{"0":"post-252237","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252237","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=252237"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252237\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/252238"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=252237"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=252237"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=252237"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}