Garda public order units deployed as anti-immigration protest shuts down Dublin city traffic

Traffic delays continue in Dublin city centre this evening, Thursday, September 19, following an anti-immigration protest.

Anti-immigration protesters are staging a sit down protest on O’Connell Bridge in central Dublin having marched back from the area around the Dáil.

There has been major traffic disruption as a result of the protest. The Green Line of the Luas is not running past St. Stephen’s Green to the north of the city due to the disruption.

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Hundreds of people gathered outside the GPO on Dublin’s O’Connell Street for an anti-immigration demonstration on Thursday afternoon.

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Dozens of Gardaí are in the area between the demonstrations to ensure rival protesters are kept apart, and Garda Public Order Units have been deployed to the scene.

The anti-immigration protestors carried Irish tricolour flags, "Erin Go Bragh" banners and "You’ll Never Beat the Irish."

"We should be like Germany, close the borders," one protestor said, while the group chanted "whose streets? Our streets" and "get them out, get them out."

They have assembled halfway down Molesworth Street facing Leinster House, with Garda barriers preventing them getting close to the gates of the parliament building.

More than a hundred anti-racism counter-demonstrators gathered close by, at the junction of Dawson Street and Molesworth Street. Participants were loudly chanting "far right loyalists, get off our streets."

Both groups dispersed from the Dáil and set off in the direction of O’Connell Street, where the anti-racism protestors arrived before the anti-immigration protestors who gathered and commenced a sit down demonstration.

*This article was originally published on Extra.ie.