“Give us what you stole from us,” the Australian senator shouts at King Charles

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — An Indigenous senator said so King Charles III that Australia was not his country and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said the monarch was not needed as the country’s head of state when the British king visited the Australian Parliament on Monday.

Indigenous Independent Senator Lidia Thorpe was escorted out of a parliamentary reception for the royal couple after shouting that British colonizers had stolen indigenous land and bones.

“You have committed genocide against our people,” she shouted. “Give us what you stole from us – our bones, our skulls, our babies, our people. You destroyed our country. Give us a contract. We want a contract.”

King Charles spoke quietly with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese while security officers blocked Senator Thorpe from approaching.

“This is not your country. “You are not my king,” Thorpe shouted as she was led out of the hall.

Albanese who wants the country become a republic He also told the king, along with an Australian head of state, that it was time to end his role.

“You have shown great respect for Australians, even at a time when we have debated the future of our own constitutional arrangements and the nature of our relationship with the Crown,” Mr Albanese said. But, he said, “nothing stands still.”

Opposition leader Peter Dutton, who wants to keep the British king as Australian monarch, noted that even supporters of a republic had the honor of attending a reception for Charles and Queen Camilla at Parliament House in the capital Canberra.

“People got their hair cut, their shoes shined, their suits ironed, and that’s just the Republicans,” Dutton quipped.

The leaders of Australia’s six states highlighted the political divide in the country’s constitutional relationship with Britain by declining invitations to the reception. All six would prefer an Australian citizen to be Australia’s head of state. They all said they had more pressing appointments on Monday, but the monarchists agreed the royals had been snubbed.

Charles used the beginning of his speech to thank Canberra’s Indigenous elder, Aunty Violet Sheridan, for her traditional welcome to the King and Queen.

“Let me also say how much I appreciated the moving Welcome to Country ceremony this morning, which gave me the opportunity to pay my respects to the traditional owners of the land on which we meet, the Ngunnawal People and all First Nations peoples who have loved us and cared for this continent for 65,000 years,” said Charles.

“Throughout my life, Australia’s indigenous people have given me the great honor of sharing their stories and cultures so generously. “I can only say how much my own experience has been shaped and strengthened by this traditional wisdom,” Charles added.

The Australians decided in one Referendum in 1999 keep Queen Elizabeth II as head of state. This result is generally seen as a result of disagreement over how a president would be elected, rather than as a result of majority support for a monarch.

Albanese has ruled out holding another referendum on the issue during his current three-year government. But there is a possibility if his centre-left Labor party is re-elected in elections next May.

Charles was drawn into the Australian Republic debate months before his visit.

The Australian republic movementwho wants Australia to break its constitutional ties with Britain, wrote to Charles in December last year demanding a meeting in Australia and the king to lobby her cause. Buckingham Palace politely wrote in March that the king’s meetings were decided by the Australian government. A meeting with the ARM is not in the official travel plan.

“Whether Australia becomes a republic is for the Australian public to decide,” Buckingham Palace’s letter said.

Earlier on Monday, Charles and Camilla laid wreaths at the Australian War Memorial and then shook hands with well-wishers on the second full day of their visit.

The memorial estimated 4,000 people came to see the couple.

Charles, 75, is there treated for cancerwhich resulted in a shortened itinerary. It is Charles’ 17th trip to Australia and the first since he became king in 2022. It is the first visit by a reigning British monarch to Australia since his late mother Queen Elizabeth II traveled to the distant country in 2011.

Charles and Camilla rested a day after arriving late Friday before making their first public appearance of the trip at a church service in Sydney on Sunday. They then flew to Canberra, where they visited the Tomb of the Unknown Australian Soldier and a reception at Parliament House.

Before leaving the war memorial, they stopped to greet hundreds of people who gathered under clear skies under Australian flags. The temperature should reach a mild high of 24 degrees Celsius (75 degrees Fahrenheit).

On Wednesday Charles will travel to Samoa where he will open the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting.