Thousands of people have marched through Melbourne demanding asylum seekers be allowed to remain in Australia and the closure of offshore detention centres.
Officer workers, students, parents and grandparents converged on the steps of the State Library at the start of the evening commute in response to the High Court's ruling on Wednesday that offshore detention was legal.
Among the crowd of about 5000 were Eleisha Mullane, her partner Boyd Maplestone and their daughters, aged one and four "We're a family and are really concerned about other families being put in a place like Nauru," Ms Mullane said.
She said Australia's treatment of refugees was unacceptable and that her own children reminded her why those fleeing persecution and war deserved to be treated with compassion.
"Once you look after another life solely, you really understand what drives people to flee those places."
The protesters marched along Swanston Street and up Bourke Street, chanting "free free the refugees, let them stay, let them stay" and staged a sit-in outside the Liberal Party's headquarters, at the corner of Exhibition Street.
About two thousand continued past Parliament House to the Department of Immigration and Border Protection's office at the corner of Spring and Lonsdale, where they blocked the intersection and set up an microphones and a PA system on the office's steps.
"We are just horrified by the decisions that are made in the name of us, as Australians," said Margaret Maguire, a member of the community group Grandmothers Against Detention of Refugee Children, from outside the office.
"Grandmothers take care," added fellow member Anne Vaughan, clad in the group's customary purple.
"And that's what these children need - someone to take care of them."
Similar protests were held in Sydney, Melbourne and Canberra and follows the extraordinary step of a number of churches offering sanctuary to asylum seekers facing deportation in the wake of the High Court's verdict.
The Age Read more:
Officer workers, students, parents and grandparents converged on the steps of the State Library at the start of the evening commute in response to the High Court's ruling on Wednesday that offshore detention was legal.
Among the crowd of about 5000 were Eleisha Mullane, her partner Boyd Maplestone and their daughters, aged one and four "We're a family and are really concerned about other families being put in a place like Nauru," Ms Mullane said.
She said Australia's treatment of refugees was unacceptable and that her own children reminded her why those fleeing persecution and war deserved to be treated with compassion.
"Once you look after another life solely, you really understand what drives people to flee those places."
The protesters marched along Swanston Street and up Bourke Street, chanting "free free the refugees, let them stay, let them stay" and staged a sit-in outside the Liberal Party's headquarters, at the corner of Exhibition Street.
About two thousand continued past Parliament House to the Department of Immigration and Border Protection's office at the corner of Spring and Lonsdale, where they blocked the intersection and set up an microphones and a PA system on the office's steps.
"We are just horrified by the decisions that are made in the name of us, as Australians," said Margaret Maguire, a member of the community group Grandmothers Against Detention of Refugee Children, from outside the office.
"Grandmothers take care," added fellow member Anne Vaughan, clad in the group's customary purple.
"And that's what these children need - someone to take care of them."
Similar protests were held in Sydney, Melbourne and Canberra and follows the extraordinary step of a number of churches offering sanctuary to asylum seekers facing deportation in the wake of the High Court's verdict.
The Age Read more:
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