Irish police have dismantled a six-day blockade of central Dublin staged by farmers and hauliers protesting against soaring fuel prices, in a coordinated nationwide operation that may signal a turning point in one of Ireland's most disruptive protest movements in recent memory. Mounted units and hundreds of officers peacefully cleared O'Connell Street — Dublin's main thoroughfare — of trucks and tractors on Sunday morning, while separate police units moved against blockades in Galway, Cork and Limerick. Pepper spray was used during the clearance of a fuel depot at Whitegate oil refinery in County Cork, where scuffles broke out.

The protests were triggered by a roughly 20% rise in diesel prices since last month, driven by the spillover effects of conflict in the Middle East on global energy markets. Farmers, hauliers and other groups responded by blockading major motorways, an oil refinery, two ports, a fuel depot and several city centres across the country. Around 600 of Ireland's approximately 1,500 petrol stations ran dry, prompting Finance Minister Simon Harris to warn of a