Hong Kong protesters divided over strategy, police facing pressure to act
HONG KONG – They captured the world’s attention and defied skeptics who doubted they could stand up to Beijing for long. Now, after 52 days, the students and other pro-democracy protesters who have occupied Hong Kong streets can’t seem to agree how to marshal a strategic retreat.
They’re tired, divided and increasingly an irritant to the public. Many want to end this phase of their protest peaceably, while others seem determined to clash with police, who face public pressure to clear them from the streets – with force if necessary.
That clearance could come any day now, especially after Wednesday, when a splinter group of demonstrators used a metal barricade to break into the Legislative Council building in downtown Hong Kong about 1 a.m.
Police used batons and pepper spray to prevent what appeared to be an attempt to occupy the legislative chambers. Three officers were reportedly injured. Six protesters were arrested.
A lawmaker sympathetic to the protests, Fernando Cheung Chiu-hung, attempted to prevent the break-in, as did several street activists, according to people who witnessed it. The lack of cohesion is clearly wearing on protest leaders, who’ve stressed that their street camps are peaceful acts of civil disobedience.
“We don’t understand the point” of the break-in, Alex Chow, secretary general of the Hong Kong Federation of Students, told reporters Wednesday. But he added that some protesters feel they have no alternative since the government has been unresponsive so far.
In a statement, the group Occupy Central with Love and Peace – made up of older democratic activists in alliance with student protesters – was less conditional in condemning the break-in.
“The Umbrella Movement emphasizes non-violent civil disobedience and the bearing of criminal responsibility,” the group said in a statement. The action in the early hours “used force to damage public property, without heed to the safety of those present.”
By Wednesday night, the atmosphere had calmed considerably at the Legislative Council chambers in Hong Kong’s Admiralty district. Workmen could be seen repairing a large shattered window. Few police were visible, and young protesters sat outside their tents chatting, studying and cleaning up the site – as they have for weeks.
Yet protesters were bracing for a police response, possibly as soon as today. That was particularly true at the protest site in the busy Mong Kok district on the Kowloon side of Hong Kong.
At the request of a bus company, a court has ordered protesters to end their occupation of roads in the district, which is a thriving shopping center. The court’s order has been posted and published in a local newspaper, the final legal steps required before bailiffs and police act to enforce it.
The South China Morning Post, citing an unnamed police official, reported Wednesday that authorities may start clearing the Mong Kok protest site by today. At least 3,000 police officers, more than a 10th of the city’s force, could be involved in the operation, according to the newspaper.
Hong Kong, a former British colony, has a long history of street activism and mass demonstrations, but the Umbrella Movement protests – named for the “brollies” protesters have used to shield themselves from pepper spray – are the biggest in the territory since it was returned to China in 1997.
The handover agreement promised Hong Kong it would retain “a high degree of autonomy” from the mainland, and Beijing has since agreed to let residents vote for a chief executive in 2017. But protesters say China is reneging on those pledges by requiring that candidates be vetted first by a committee loyal to Beijing.