King Charles III's coronation procession met with boos, chants of 'not my King'. Watch!

The coronation procession of the newly crowned King Charles III was met with boos and chants of "not my King" on Saturday (May 6). As per Reuters, anti-monarchy protestors took to the streets of Central London, protesting along the route of the newly crowned British King. 

More than 11,000 police and facial-recognition technology were deployed to stamp out any attempted disruption.

As per AFP, the police have arrested leading members of the Republic campaign group. Its leader Graham Smith is among those arrested. Five other organisers from the pressure group have been detained.

The police also seized hundreds of their placards, said Republic, just hours ahead of Charles's crowning.

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"They won't tell us why they've arrested them or where they're being held," said a Republic activist while talking to AFP at Trafalgar Square.

Taking to Twitter the Met tweeted that four people were held "on suspicion of conspiracy to cause public nuisance," and that they've also "seized lock-on devices" — the newly outlawed contraptions as per AFP are used by demonstrators to attach themselves to each other, an object or the ground. 

Human Rights Watch has criticised the arrests, calling them "incredibly alarming."

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Yasmine Ahmed, Human Rights UK Director, in a statement, said: "This is something you would expect to see in Moscow, not London."

"Peaceful protests allow individuals to hold those in power to account — something the UK government seems increasingly averse to," added Ahmed.

AFP reports that numerous activists were seen being handcuffed by the police on The Mall, the processional route from Buckingham Palace to Trafalgar Square. The detentions infuriated the large number of other demonstrators, who had come together at The Mall and Trafalgar Square.

Environmental activist group 'Just Stop Oil' claims: "Their intention was only to display T-shirts and flags. This is a massive authoritarian overreach," and that none of those arrested had "glue, paint or any plans to disrupt the coronation". 

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"New policing laws mean we're now living in a dystopian nightmare — this disgraceful over-reach is what you'd expect in Pyongyang, North Korea, not Westminster," it added.

Anti-monarchy group Republic, which wants the monarch replaced by an elected head of the State, has been vocal about its protest plans. However, as per AFP, the group's leader Smith earlier this week said that the group had no plans to disrupt the procession.

Harry Stratton, Republic's director claims that placard-carrying activists were stopped by around 20 police officers near Trafalgar Square.

"Graham and our volunteers asked why and they said 'we will find that out'," he claims. "After that, they arrested them, saying, 'we are seizing all these placards'."

(With inputs from agencies)

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