OTTAWA, Ontario (AP) — Canadian police Wednesday began warning truckers who have been protesting the country’s COVID-19 restrictions and clogging the streets of Ottawa for nearly three weeks that they must leave now.
Officers knocked on the doors of the rigs parked outside the Parliament building and handed out notices informing drivers they risk arrest and the loss of their licenses under Canada’s Emergencies Act.
Police also began ticketing vehicles.
Some truckers ripped up the order, and one protester shouted, “I will never go home!”
The warnings came just days after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau invoked the law and gave authorities power to ban the blockades and tow away the trucks.
Since late January, protesters in trucks and other vehicles have jammed the streets of the capital and obstructed border crossings, decrying vaccine mandates for truckers and other COVID-19 precautions and condemning Trudeau’s Liberal government.
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Gillies reported from Toronto. Associated Press writer Robert Bumsted in Ottawa contributed to this report.
