TORONTO, 10 February 2022, (TON): Canadian authorities are scrambling to find ways to end the 12-day-long occupation of the national capital’s downtown, hoping a combination of criminal charges, traffic tickets and the prospect of losing access to fuel will end the blockades.

The number of protesters in Ottawa against public health measures to fight pandemic is dropping, police say, in the face of tougher policing and a 10-day injunction to silence honking something residents say kept them up at night with incessant noise.

Deputy police chief Steve Bell said “but many of the remaining demonstrators in Ottawa were highly determined and volatile.”

The protests have spread to other cities, and late Monday demonstrators blocked the Ambassador Bridge linking Canada and the United States, one of the busiest border crossings on the continent, for nearly a full day.

Protesters say they are peaceful but some waved Confederate Flags and Swastikas in the occupation’s early days. Some Ottawa residents have said they were attacked and harassed.

Criminal investigations are under way into, among other things, an attempted arson at a downtown apartment building.