Premier's call on bridge protest ‘open season'
Police estimate between 90,000 to 100,000 people were crammed onto the bridge on Sunday, calling for an end to the war in Gaza. Up to 100,000 people marched on the Sydney Harbour Bridge on Sunday. Tom Parrish Credit: News Corp Australia
Protesters began marching on the Sydney landmark about 2pm on Sunday, with tens of thousands chanting 'free, free Palestine', waving flags and holding placards.
Police issued an urgent call to protesters about 3pm on Sunday, instructing them to 'turn around' to avoid a 'crowd crush' on the bridge.
'Participants have been asked to stop proceeding across the bridge to avoid a crowd crush at the northern end of the harbour bridge,' the statement read. People waved flags and placards in support of Palestine. Tom Parrish Credit: News Corp Australia
'Once the procession has come to a halt, protesters will be asked to turn around and walk back toward Wynyard to avoid a risk of injury due to the huge number of people taking part.
'Police believe the safest route back is to walk back across the bridge given the huge numbers to avoid overwhelming the public transport system and a potential crowd crush scenario.' Premier Chris Minns said it was not 'open season' for further marches on the bridge. NewsWire / Flavio Brancaleone Credit: News Corp Australia
Speaking to media on Monday, NSW Premier Chris Minns said despite a judge allowing the demonstration organisers to go ahead with the protest, it would not be 'open season' for others to follow suit.
'My job is to be on the side of public safety and ensuring that people can live and work and protest and enjoy a city as big as Sydney,' he said.
'It's not an easy thing to get right.'
He said while he accepted the court's decision to allow the protest on the bridge and accepted that 'people came to the protest and acted peacefully', he argued it should not encourage further protests on the landmark.
'No-one should assume it's open season on the bridge,' he said.
'We're not gonna have a situation where the anti-vaxxer group has it one Saturday, then the weekend after that, Critical Mass takes over, then the weekend after that, an environmental cause, then the weekend after that because of an industrial dispute.
'You'd accept that's a situation that a big city like Sydney couldn't cope with.' The protest was peaceful, police and the Premier said. Tom Parrish Credit: News Corp Australia
He added that while the protest was 'lawful' and protesters acted peacefully, he said the issue was a matter of public safety.
'Police had to deal with a very difficult logistic situation, where you had tens of thousands of people in a confined space, and for many people who wanted to get on the bridge, they had to be turned away,' he said.
'I'm not putting that blame on demonstrators. This was a lawful march. It had been agreed to by the courts.
'I'm just making the point that it was a confined space and there was a massive number of people, and that was the challenge police had to deal with.' Police said they were not provided enough time to prepare for the protest. Tom Parrish Credit: News Corp Australia
Minster for Police and Counter Terrorism Yasmin Catley said there was 'very little time' for police to prepare for the protest, adding they were 'concerned about public safety'.
'Something of this magnitude would take absolutely months, many months … to organise,' she said.
'The police made it very clear that they did not have enough time to put in place the contingencies required for such a large crowd into the city.
'Never before has there been a protest of that magnitude in our city and given that it was incident free, I have to say thank you to the NSW Police.'
When asked if police would consider banning future protests along the Harbour Bridge, she said 'people are allowed to protest in this state', but must act 'lawfully, peacefully and take the direction of the police'.
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