Via Rail passenger trains as well as Canadian National freight trains were delayed for several hours Saturday morning after about 30 pro-Palestinian demonstrators blocked a CN track in St. Bruno, Que., south of Montreal.
The railway line owned by CN connects Montreal to Halifax, where protesters claim goods are shipped to Israel.
Local Longueuil police said that they received a 911 call at about 10:05 a.m. They asked protesters blocking the tracks at the intersection of Sir Wilfrid Laurier and Seigneurial boulevards to move. According to police spokesperson Melanie Mercille, after protesters refused to move, the police’s emergency intervention unit broke up the barricade an hour and a half later.
Police say four officers were pepper sprayed and four people, both men and women in their 20s and 30s, are facing charges ranging from obstruction to assault.
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Mercille added that other demonstrators fled and that police were patrolling the area …