SkyNews.com.au
Updated: 18:56, Thursday July 19, 2012
Protesters at Roxby Downs have chained themselves to a truck on the main road. Picture: Ben Hyde Source: AdelaideNow
Five people have been arrested after renewed protest action at the Olympic Dam uranium and copper mine in South Australia's north.
The arrests on Thursday brought to 18 the number of people taken into police custody since about 350 anti-nuclear activists converged on the area on Saturday.
The official protest was scheduled to wind up on Wednesday but up to 100 people remained in the area.
Police said about 40 people blocked Olympic Way, just south of the declared protected area, on Thursday morning.
They pushed a car onto the road, let down its tyres and locked the steering.
The action forced a truck to stop on the road and two men then chained themselves to the underside.
They were arrested and charged with illegal interference. Three other people were charged with refusing to follow police direction.
'Police liaised with the protesters and asked them several times to move on from the area but they have continually refused to follow police direction,' a spokeswoman said.
'The aim of police is to ensure a peaceful and lawful protest, however demonstrators have continually refused to comply with instructions.'
Thursday's action followed the arrest of 13 people on Tuesday when protesters clashed twice with police.
In the second of those incidents, seven people were charged with failing to follow a police direction when they blocked a road and staged a cricket match.
Organisers described the police response as 'heavy handed' and also criticised the police tactics employed for the duration of the protest.
'We are extremely disappointed by the tactics of police, which have included barricading us into our camp, constant surveillance and spotlighting by helicopter, motorbikes and patrol cars 24 hours a day,' spokeswoman Nectaria Calan said in a statement.
'With close to a one-on-one ratio of protesters to police it is hard to understand how the state can justify this excessive deployment of resources.'
The protest at Olympic Dam was staged to stop the $30 billion expansion of the copper and uranium mine.
If the expansion goes ahead annual copper production will triple to about 750,000 tonnes and uranium oxide production will jump to 19,000 tonnes.
Source: SkyNews.com.au
Similar Story: Herald Sun
