Aborigine protesters have brandished the shoe lost by Julia Gillard as she was rescued from a violent demonstration, claiming they want it to be the symbol of a move to “give us back our country”. 

 

The shoe -- a dark blue, size 36 Midas pump -- has been handed to an Aboriginal elder, Pat Eatock, who says Gillard should collect it within a week or it will be sold on ebay, The Daily Telegraph reported on Sunday.

 

A shoe purported to be Gillard's fetched bids of £1400 Sunday before it was removed from sale. 

 

“I see it sitting like Cinderella's shoe in a glass case in a museum 10 years from now as this is part of the history of race relations in Australia,” said Eatock, 75, who was the first Aboriginal woman to seek election to Parliament. 

 

The scenes in Canberra Saturday caused a furor in Australia, prompting widespread media coverage, inflaming racial tensions and leading to the sacking of one of the prime minister's aides. 

 

On Sunday, protesters calling for Aboriginal sovereignty burnt an Australian flag outside Parliament House, as indigenous leaders called for calm and some dismissed the recent violence as a disgrace. 

 

The angry scenes in Canberra were triggered by airing of remarks by the Opposition leader, Tony Abbott, who suggested a 40-year-old makeshift Aboriginal tent embassy was no longer relevant and should be dismantled. Activists at the embassy then shifted their protests to a nearby function being attended by Abbott and Gillard. 

 

Aborigine protesters, who were demonstrating against European settlers’ centuries-long persecution of the indigenous people of the continent, confronted Prime Minister Gillard on Thursday, which was Australia Day.

 

Scores of police escorted Gillard and Abbott from Canberra's Lobby restaurant after it was surrounded by around two hundred Aboriginal protesters, BBC reported. 

 

Gillard appeared distressed as she was pulled away from the encirclement of protesters but escaped unhurt. 

 

Supporters of indigenous rights had besieged the restaurant and banged its windows while Gillard and Abbott were inside officiating at an award ceremony to commemorate Australia's national day. 

 

Chaos followed as a bodyguard grabbed Gillard, with one of her shoes off, by the shoulders and shoved her into a car. Many protesters chased the Australian prime minister and continued to bang on the car's rooftop and the bonnet as it was driven off. 

 

Australia celebrates January 26 as Australia Day to mark the arrival of the British First Fleet, which came to Sydney in 1788 to establish the penal colony of New South Wales and to begin the European colonization of the Australian continent. 

 

The Aborigines mourn the day as an Invasion Day, saying the Europeans invaded their continent and systematically massacred hundreds of thousands of indigenous people, killed with guns, poisoned water and food, and many died from diseases, such as smallpox, measles, and influenza, introduced by the invaders. 

 

It was estimated that about one million Australian Aborigines inhabited the country within 500 different tribes in 1788. Today, 224 years later, there are some 300,000 Aborigines left in the country.