King Charles heckled by Indigenous MP during Australia tour
October 21, 2024
Britain's King Charles III and Queen Camilla visited Australia's capital Canberra on Monday for their first visit to the city in nearly a decade.
Charles' six-day jaunt to Australia, which started on Friday, is the monarch's first since he became the head of state of the commonwealth country in September 2022.
It is also the British King's first major foreign tour since he was diagnosed with cancer in February this year.
'Give us our land back'
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and other senior officials hosted a reception for the King and Queen in Parliament House later in the day.
Just moments after Charles wrapped up his speech in parliament about his time as a teenager in Australia and the threats of climate change, an Indigenous senator shouted anti-colonial slogans at him.
"Give us our land back! Give us what you stole from us!" Lidia Thorpe, an independent lawmaker who sits in the upper house, yelled.
"This is not your land, you are not my king," Thorpe said as she railed against what she described as a "genocide" of Indigenous Australians by European settlers.
"You committed genocide against our people," she said.
Charles, who remained otherwise unfazed, was seen speaking quietly to Albanese while the senator was stopped by security from approaching the King.
As Thorpe was gently escorted from the hall she continued shouting: "Give us what you stole from us — our bones, our skulls, our babies, our people. You destroyed our land. Give us a treaty. We want a treaty."
Australia's republic debate
Meanwhile, the debate over making Australia a republic was again brought up. Albanese, who wants Australia to become a republic with an Australian head of state, also told the king it was time for his role to end.
"You have shown great respect for Australians, even during times when we have debated the future of our own constitutional arrangements and the nature of our relationship with the Crown," Albanese said.
But, he added, "nothing stands still."
The Australian Republic Movement, which wants Australia to sever its constitutional ties with Britain, wrote to Charles in December 2023 requesting a meeting in Australia and for the king to advocate their cause. Buckingham Palace replied saying that the matter is up to the Australian public to decide.
dvv/wmr (AP, Reuters, AFP, dpa)