Vienna:
Tens of thousands of people gathered in Vienna on Saturday to protest restrictions put in place to stop the spread of the coronavirus in Austria, including mandatory COVID-19 vaccines and house arrest for the unvaccinated.
About 1,400 police officers were on hand to oversee the protest, which drew an estimated 44,000 people, following a similar demonstration in the Austrian capital last week.
Police said three people were arrested for offenses including using fireworks and disregarding the requirement to wear masks. Journalists covering the event, which began in Heldenplatz square, were attacked with snowballs and ice, and one reporter was the victim of an attempted assault, police said.
The crowd was addressed by Herbert Kickl, leader of the right-wing Austrian Freedom Party, who attacked the government’s response to the pandemic. He said the public did not realize they were being “kicked in the ass” by the government and said the protests would continue.
Separately, some 2,500 people protested against the restrictions in Klagenfurt, while 150 people demonstrated in Linz.
Facing rising daily infections, Austria last month became the first country in Western Europe to reinstate a lockdown and said it would make vaccinations mandatory from February.
Banners reading “No to mandatory vaccination” and “Hands off our children” were carried by protesters in Vienna, chanting “We are the people” and “resistance”.
Austria, with a population of 8.9 million people, has reported 1.2 million cases of coronavirus and more than 13,000 deaths since the start of the pandemic last year.
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