As we speak information
2025-01-24 01:07:00
Australian police are investigating after a statue of Captain James Prepare dinner was lined in crimson paint and disfigured, forward of the Australia Day weekend.
It’s the second time in 12 months that the statue in Sydney has been vandalised.
Australia Day is a nationwide vacation that’s held annually on 26 January – the anniversary of Britain’s First Fleet touchdown at Sydney Cove in 1788. Many Indigenous Australians say the date causes them ache.
The native council in Randwick – the suburb the place the statue is situated – described the vandalism as “a disservice to the group and a disservice to reconciliation”.
Councillor Carolyn Martin informed Sydney radio station 2GB that the vandals had knocked off one hand and components of the face and nostril.
The statue – which was first unveiled in 1874 – was beforehand focused in February final 12 months, when it was lined with crimson paint and had components of its sandstone broken. Works to restore and restore it have been accomplished a month later.
There are a number of Captain Prepare dinner statues throughout Australia, and others have additionally been vandalised on or round 26 January.
In 2024, one in Melbourne was lower down on the eve of the vacation, whereas its plinth was spray-painted with the phrases “the colony will fall”. Two years earlier the identical statue had been splashed with crimson paint, whereas in 2018 it was graffitied with the phrases “no satisfaction” and had an Aboriginal flag positioned subsequent to it.
