An Aboriginal protester was arrested at the Sydney Opera House as crowds awaited a glimpse of the King and Queen on the final day of their tour in Australia. Wayne Wharton, a prominent Indigenous activist from Brisbane, was arrested after shouting anti-monarchist slogans and refusing a police order to move on. This comes as backlash over an Aboriginal senator’s heckling of King Charles in Canberra on Monday intensifies. Mr. Wharton had shouted “he’s not my King”, echoing the words of independent Senator Lidia Thorpe the day before. The crowd waiting for the royals – many clutching mini union jack flags – shouted back “God save the King”. Thorpe’s protest has been praised by some Indigenous activists as brave, but condemned by other prominent Aboriginal Australians as “embarrassing” and disrespectful. It has also been roundly criticized by her parliamentary peers. On Tuesday, Thorpe said she had deleted a violent cartoon of the King that was posted to her Instagram account, describing it as “inappropriate” and posted by a staff member without her knowledge. Outside the Sydney Opera House, onlookers applauded officers when Mr. Wharton was arrested and placed into a police van. Many of the hundreds there had been queuing since early on Tuesday, a few draped in British flags. Others had accessorized with royal-themed jewelry and handbags. Nellie Pollard-Wharton, who was with her father as he was arrested, said it was “laughable” to watch crowds “cheering as he’s put into a paddy wagon [police van] for standing up for his rights”. “[But we] need to keep resisting so we can have treaties, so we can have our rights heard, so our young people and our men and women in custody stop dying, so that our health outcomes improve… so we can actually self-determine.” On the other side of the city, King Charles began Tuesday with a visit to the National Centre of Indigenous Excellence in Redfern, where he met with Aboriginal elders. He later attended a community picnic in Parramatta, where the suit-clad monarch had a go at cooking sausages on a barbecue before meeting a sheepdog.
