OTTAWA, Ontario — Canada’s public safety minister said Monday that U.S.
A day after the city declared a state of emergency, the mayor pleaded for almost 2,000 extra police officers to help quell the raucous nightly demonstrations staged by the so-called Freedom Truck Convoy, which has used hundreds of parked trucks to paralyze the Canadian capital’s business district.
A truck-convoy protest near the Ambassador Bridge, the busiest border crossing between Canada and the U.S., caused long traffic backups along the span from the Detroit side of the Detroit River.
Protesters have said they will not leave until all vaccine mandates and COVID-19 restrictions are lifted.
In a letter to Trudeau and the public safety minister, Ottawa Mayor Jim Watson said “what was initially described as a peaceful protest has now turned into a siege of our downtown area” with 400 to 500 trucks.
Dominic LeBlanc, the minister of intergovernmental affairs, blamed the GOP interference for inciting disorderly conduct and helping to fund entities that are not respecting Canadian law.
Trudeau has called the protesters a “fringe,” but he faces calls by the opposition Conservative party to extend an “olive branch” to them.
Meanwhile, Ottawa police were investigating a fire at an apartment building that was apparently set by protesters.
Surveillance video showed two men light a package of the bricks in the lobby and tape or tie the front door handles together before leaving through a side door before dawn.