"Covid-19 Wellington protest: Frontline police officer says it was a 'war zone' - NZ Herald"https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/covid-19-wellington-protest-frontline-police-officer-says-it-was-a-war-zone/7HAS7DRUGJYGEMXCRAH6BCMYNE
Pelted by a paver, unable to move, a frontline police officer fell to the ground thinking he might die. :((
When he looked up, the sky was raining bricks and flaming projectiles against his plastic shield. It was, in his words, "a war zone".
Speaking for the first time since he was injured, the detective, whom the Herald on Sunday has chosen not to name, says watching the increasingly violent anti-mandate protest on Parliament grounds unfold didn't sit well with him. With his wife's encouragement, he put his hand up to go to Wellington to join his colleagues on the frontline.
"I was angry we were being treated like that. I wanted to do my bit. This protest had all the hallmarks of the Capitol siege when protesters tried to overturn Trump's defeat - the violence, the anger, the intense hatred from the disenfranchised and the rabid right-wing.(https://www.nzherald.co.nz/resizer/vlhC0jMenBL1kFAXdMUq7Q-ckY0=/1440x948/smart/filters:quality(70)/cloudfront-ap-southeast-2.images.arcpublishing.com/nzme/BEGAOP3TRDI4JA6TQVX4Q23C3U.jpg)
Black NZ protesters Turn a Fire-Hose Against Police
"We had a unique opportunity and some of us were champing at the bit to go there in whatever capacity."