Police in Sydney have released CCTV footage as part of their investigation into the vandalism of a statue of Captain Cook ahead of Australia Day.
The statue in Randwick was defaced with red paint and had pieces broken off at about 4am on January 24, and was one of a number of memorials around the country damaged or destroyed by anti-Australian far-left extremists in the lead-up to the national day.
NSW Police have now released CCTV of two people – a man and a woman – they believe may be able to assist with enquiries.
Police have released CCTV of two people they believe may be able to assist with their investigation into the alleged vandalism of a Captain Cook statue in the lead-up to Australia Day. pic.twitter.com/pNdY6xZxjk
— The Noticer (@NoticerNews) February 13, 2025
“The man seen in the CCTV is described as wearing a black jacket, a black t-shirt with a logo on it, dark pants, black sneakers, and black hair,” police said.
“The woman in the images is described as wearing a green/grey jacket, black pants and thongs, with brown hair.”
Australia’s leading Anglo-Celtic advocacy group the British Australian Community, which has documented more than 40 vandalism attacks on Australian monuments as part of its Name Back campaign, slammed the attack on the Randwick statue.
“It’s not just disgusting Anglophobic vandalism, it’s also the oldest statue of Captain Cook in Australia. There’s also an amazing story behind how it came to be,” the BAC wrote on X.
Our heritage is under siege. Over 40 statues and memorials, from ANZAC heroes to Captain Cook, have been vandalised, toppled, or defaced. These aren’t random acts of destruction—this is a coordinated campaign to erase our Anglo-Celtic foundations and demoralise our people.
When… pic.twitter.com/AdqMECdtve
— British Australian Community (@Brit_Aus_Com) February 7, 2025
After the statue was vandalised BAC President Harry Richardson wrote an open letter to the country’s police ministers asking for a dedicated police guard to protect prominent monuments in the lead-up to Australia Day.
“The British Australian Community is concerned that continuing ambivalence to the desecration of our monuments sends a signal to politically-motivated extremists that not only are the physical monuments to Australia’s British heritage open targets for ongoing attack, but also that Australia’s British-descended population are similarly ripe targets for attack,” he wrote.
“The British Australian Community thanks police forces nationwide for their indefatigable work protecting our communities and hopes our political representatives will do the right thing and mount a defence of our nation’s British heritage.”
No arrests have been made over the incident, and police in Victoria are yet to make arrests over the vandalism of 20 bronze busts of Australian prime ministers in Ballarat, the defacing of Melbourne’s Queen Victoria Memorial, an Anzac memorial and a statue of John Batman.
Header image: Left, the vandalised statue (Randwick Mayor). Right, CCTV of two people police believe may be able to assist with enquiries (NSW Police).
