Lidia Thorpe, the Aboriginal senator who challenged the King Charles III on colonization during the monarch’s visit to the Australian Parliament on October 21, received a symbolic sanction on Monday. Senators voted 46 to 12 in favor of a motion of censure against her, deeming her behavior “infamous“, “disruptive and disrespectful“. Censure is a purely symbolic sanction designed to express elected representatives’ dissatisfaction with the actions of one of their number.

During his six-day tour of the Oceanian country of which he is head of state, King Charles passed through Parliament for a speech. At the end of the speech, Lidia Thorpe shouted: “Give us back our land, give us back what you stole from us!“

In a minute-long diatribe, she also proclaimed: “You are not my king“, denouncing what she described as “genocide“Lidia Thorpe then turned her back on the monarch and other dignitaries as they stood for the national anthem. Lidia Thorpe then turned her back on the monarch and other dignitaries as they stood for the national anthem.

“I will resist colonization in this country”

Australia was a British colony for over a century, during which thousands of Aboriginal Australians were killed and entire communities displaced.

It gained de facto independence in 1901, but never became a republic. Charles III remains head of state. On national broadcaster ABC, Lidia Thorpe expressed her disappointment at being sanctioned, saying she “would do it again“the same thing if the king came back.

“I will resist colonization in this land. I pledge allegiance to the true sovereigns of these lands: the First Peoples are the true sovereigns.“she declared, referring to Australia’s original inhabitants.