Canadian police arresting protesters, towing rigs in Ottawa

OTTAWA, Ontario (AP) — Going nose-to-nose with protesters, police began arresting people and towing away vehicles Friday in a bid to break the three-week siege of Canada’s capital by hundreds of truckers angry over the country’s COVID-19 restrictions.

Trucks began leaving Parliament Hill in the afternoon as lines of officers pushed through the streets.

Hundreds of police, some in riot gear and some carrying automatic weapons, descended into the protest zone in the morning and led demonstrators away in handcuffs through Ottawa’s newly snow-covered streets as holdouts blared their horns in defiance. Police smashed through the door of at least one RV camper before hauling it away.

Tow truck operators — wearing neon-green ski masks, with their companies’ decals taped over on their trucks to conceal their identities — arrived under police escort and got to work removing the big rigs, campers and other vehicles parked bumper to bumper and shoulder to shoulder near Parliament.

Scuffles broke out in places, and police repeatedly pushed the crowd back amid cries of “Freedom!” and the singing of the national anthem, “O Canada.”

Hours into the show of force, authorities gave no estimate of the number of arrests or any injuries in one of the biggest police enforcement actions in Canada’s history, with officers drawn from around the country.

Some protesters surrendered and several trucks pulled out as the crackdown on the self-styled Freedom Convoy unfolded. Ontario Premier Doug Ford said around midday: “There are indications we are now starting to see progress.”

But many other protesters stood their ground.

“Freedom was never free,” said trucker Kevin Homaund, of Montreal. “So what if they put the handcuffs on us and they put us...