A man arrested for immigration offenses was released after protesters went to the scene and tried to “block” law enforcement.
A group of people gathered for hours in south-east London to stop a vehicle where the man was detained from leaving.
Images of the scene showed a crowd sitting on the ground in front of a van in Peckham, while another clip showed members of the audience shouting “let go” to the attending agents.
Metropolitan police officers were called to Evan Cook Close shortly after 1:30 p.m. Saturday after reports of “protesters obstructing immigration officers.”
The man the immigration officers were trying to detain was understood to be Nigerian and his visa was suspected to have been passed.
An activist with the Stand Up To Racism arm in south London, who only gave her name as Nicola, said police had “given up” trying to arrest people at the scene.
She said: “Police tried to arrest a number of activists at the front, but were caught by others who were also sitting and the police surrendered.
“And finally, after a lot of protests, the police announced that they would release him (the detained man) and it took, I don’t know, about half an hour to open the doors, so we all stayed. He asked that that will happen quickly “.
Authorities later said the detained man was released on immigration bail.
A Met spokesman said: “Officers attended and found that a van was blocked from leaving the scene.
“A man has been arrested by immigration officers for immigration offenses.”
“We’ve all sat down”
Eleanor Janega said people were alerted that an immigration raid was taking place “so locals went down to block it”.
He added: “We had been sitting here blocking the van and making ice sticks. They brought in more policemen and tried to break up the crowd by pushing us. We all sat down.”
Labor councilor Reginald Popoola said people attending the scene had surrounded “the van peacefully”, but said some people were pushed during the demonstration.
Referring to the man’s release on bail, Popoola said: “They release him, the peaceful protest is powerful.”
“Obstructing them will not deter them from taking on their duties”
An Interior Ministry spokeswoman said: “Preventing immigration control teams from doing their job is unacceptable.
“Blocking or obstructing them will not deter them from taking on the duties that the public rightly expects them to do.”
It comes amid disputes over government plans to send more than 30 people to Rwanda on Tuesday.
The Home Office says they arrived in the UK illegally and are being sent there to process their asylum applications.
On Friday, the High Court ruled that a flight that will take asylum seekers to the East African country can continue.
The Interior Ministry will schedule more flights this year.
Rwanda has defended the scheme, calling for it to be “given a chance” after it was said that Prince Charles had privately called it “creepy”.