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Hong Kong Protesters Surround City Leader’s Office in Renewed Confrontation Hong Kong Protesters Surround City Leader’s Office in Renewed Confrontation
(about 5 hours later)
HONG KONG — Protesters and the police clashed in the political heart of Hong Kong on Sunday night, when thousands of pro-democracy demonstrators surged around the city leader’s office, seeking to blockade it and other government offices, and officers used pepper spray to repel them. The confrontation ended weeks of relative calm at the protesters’ main street camp. HONG KONG — Protests that have buffeted Hong Kong for more than two months entered a volatile new phase when pro-democracy demonstrators and the police clashed early Monday morning over control of access to the government’s headquarters.
The confrontation erupted soon after student leaders of the protest movement urged supporters to besiege city government offices ahead of the working day on Monday, in an attempt to force concessions to the protesters’ demands for democratic elections for the city leader. A night of seesaw battles in the political heart of the city ended weeks of anxious calm at the protesters’ main street camp, and threw into question how much longer the Hong Kong government would tolerate hundreds of tents in Admiralty neighborhood, a stone’s throw from the city’s administrative and legislative complex.
“Surround the government headquarters,” Nathan Law, a leading member of the Hong Kong Federation of Students, an organization of university students, said from a podium in the Admiralty district where thousands of protesters had gathered. The protest area is a few minutes’ walk from the city government offices that the demonstrators have threatened to besiege. Student protest leaders, who have dithered and debated over the direction of their movement, said their patience had expired.
Minutes after he spoke, thousands of protesters rushed toward the government offices, including the headquarters of Hong Kong’s chief executive, the city’s top leader, where the police were ready with barricades and anti-riot equipment. “We feel that the government feels no pressure if this movement simply drags on like this,” said Oscar Lai, a leader of Scholarism, a protest group of high school and university students, who urged protesters to peacefully block the Hong Kong leader’s office. “This escalation shows that Hong Kong people can’t wait anymore.”
“Surround the government,” protesters chanted as the police, with riot shields and helmets, came out to face them at two ends of a road leading to the chief executive’s office. Rousing speeches in the Admiralty protest camp and calls for peaceful disobedience earlier in the night gave way to chaotic, panicky strife at the nearby government complex, where the police used pepper spray and batons to drive back protesters. The clashes erupted soon after student leaders urged protesters to besiege city government offices, in an attempt to force concessions to their demands for democratic elections for the city’s leader. The protesters say election plans for the city offered by the Chinese government are a sham that will not give voters a real say.
Officers raised flags warning that people faced arrest if they did not leave, but the crowd remained defiant and surged across a harborside road and blocked the chief executive’s office. “Surround the government,” Nathan Law, a leading member of the Hong Kong Federation of Students, said from a podium in the Admiralty protest camp where thousands of people had gathered. The camp is a few minutes’ walk from the city government offices that the demonstrators had threatened to besiege.
The police then used pepper spray to force back the crowd, and soon dozens of protesters lay on the grass of an adjacent park receiving treatment from first-aid teams. Protesters in masks, some also with helmets and goggles, carried metal barricades from the nearby area to build roadblocks. The police later issued warnings for the protesters to leave and confrontations broke out between officers and thousands of defiant, roaring demonstrators. Minutes later, thousands of protesters surged toward the government offices, including the headquarters of Hong Kong’s chief executive, where the police were ready with barricades and anti-riot equipment. The action ended an armistice that for several weeks had allowed government staff members and the chief executive, Leung Chun-ying, to go to work minutes from the protest camp without any hindrance.
The protesters’ action ended an armistice that for several weeks had allowed government staff members and the chief executive, Leung Chun-ying, to go to work minutes from the protest camp. By 3 a.m. Monday, the police had arrested 40 people in Admiralty, the site of the largest remaining protest camp. (Protesters also maintain a much smaller street camp in Causeway Bay, a shopping district.) Radio Television Hong Kong, the city’s public broadcaster, reported more arrests were likely, citing the police.
“The action tonight is to paralyze government operations,” Alex Chow, the secretary-general of the Hong Kong Federation of Students, one of the two student groups that initiated the siege, said early Monday. “Our objective is very clear, which is to have the government respond to our demand, and this action will continue until they respond.” The protesters’ actions were “completely in contravention of the organizers’ declared principles of nonviolence,” the police said in a separate statement.
The escalation of the protests came after a week in which the increasingly tired and beleaguered pro-democracy movement lost its street camp in the Mong Kok neighborhood, one of three such camps that they have held since Sept. 28. Back then, a police operation to disperse protesters backfired, and thousands of residents surged onto the streets, irate at the police’s use of batons, pepper spray and tear gas. The escalation of conflict came after a week in which the increasingly tired and beleaguered pro-democracy movement lost its street camp in the Mong Kok neighborhood, one of three such camps that demonstrators have held since Sept. 28. Back then, a police operation to disperse protesters backfired, and thousands of residents surged onto the streets, irate at the police’s use of batons, pepper spray and tear gas.
Now Admiralty, the site of the sole remaining large protest camp, has become the focus of a test of strength between the protesters and the government. But if student protest leaders felt they could no longer wait, they offered little illumination of how they expected to succeed by urging demonstrators to surround the government’s headquarters and attempting to choke off access to it before the start of the workweek. Even protesters caught up in the euphoria of defiance feared they could win only a Pyrrhic victory before the police regained the upper hand.
Many protesters at the site said they supported the idea of raising pressure on the government to force it to concede to demands for democratic elections for Hong Kong’s chief executive. But many said they saw little hope of succeeding.
“I don’t know if we can hold out for so long,” said Murphy Wong, a writer who was among the protesters outside the barricades at the chief executive’s office. Like many protesters, he wore goggles and a surgical mask as protection against police pepper spray. “I’m not very confident our movement can influence and outlast the government,” he said. “But if we didn’t make our point, it would be even worse.”“I don’t know if we can hold out for so long,” said Murphy Wong, a writer who was among the protesters outside the barricades at the chief executive’s office. Like many protesters, he wore goggles and a surgical mask as protection against police pepper spray. “I’m not very confident our movement can influence and outlast the government,” he said. “But if we didn’t make our point, it would be even worse.”
The police and other Hong Kong government officials had warned students not to converge on Admiralty, the local news media reported. The police senior superintendent, Kong Man-keung, said officers would take “resolute action to stop any attempts to besiege the government headquarters,” Radio Television Hong Kong reported. Police raised flags warning that people faced arrest if they did not leave, but the crowd remained defiant and poured across a harborside road and blocked the chief executive’s office. The police with riot shields and helmets then used pepper spray to force back the crowd, and soon dozens of protesters lay on the grass of an adjacent park while first-aid teams poured water on their stinging eyes.
In mid-October, the government offices and a nearby traffic tunnel and park became a battleground between the police and protesters who blockaded the chief executive’s office, which sits near Victoria Harbor. Hundreds of police officers used pepper spray to disperse hundreds of demonstrators who had barricaded a harborfront road near the office. “The action tonight is to paralyze government operations,” Alex Chow, the secretary-general of the Hong Kong Federation of Students, one of the two student groups that initiated the attempted siege, said early Monday. “Our objective is very clear, which is to have the government respond to our demand, and this action will continue until they respond.”
Many hundreds of police have continued to guard Mong Kok. Since the protest camp there was demolished, crowds of protesters have returned to the area each evening, attempting to block streets and test police resolve. The police said they arrested nine demonstrators on Saturday night in Mong Kok and nearby areas. Nearly 200 people were arrested over previous nights. But as has happened before in the protests, the police forces regrouped and drove back the protesters. Around 1:30 a.m. on Monday, police officers stormed onto the roadway outside the chief executive’s office, and protesters retreated, many shouting and running in panic.
The two student groups at the forefront of the protests had urged supporters to congregate on Sunday in Admiralty, which is next to the Hong Kong government office complex where the protests first erupted in late September. The police and other Hong Kong government officials had warned students not to converge on Admiralty. The police senior superintendent, Kong Man-keung, said officers would take “resolute action to stop any attempts to besiege the government headquarters,” Radio Television Hong Kong reported on Sunday.
The Hong Kong Federation of Students urged people to “put greater pressure on the government” and to bring the now-familiar paraphernalia of the protesters: safety helmets and drinking water, as well as goggles and umbrellas, which have been used to fend off bursts of pepper spray from the police attempting to break up demonstrations. Overnight, the police forced the protesters to the edges of a nearby park facing Victoria Harbor. But hundreds refused to leave, and at times surrounded clusters of riot police. The back-and-forth struggle lasted for more than an hour until the police retreated to form a cordon at the edge of Lung Wo Road, on a harbor front near the government buildings, which they cleared of protesters’ barricades and debris. But protesters marshaled their strength and regained control of the road.
Scholarism, the political movement of high school and university students, also urged protesters to come equipped with masks, goggles and umbrellas “because the police could at any time use batons, pepper spray and a variety of chemical weapons.” At around 7 a.m., however, the police moved against the exhausted, shivering protesters, many of whom were sleeping on the road. The startled crowd threw water bottles and umbrellas at the advancing cordons of officers, but the police swiftly overwhelmed resistance and won back control of the road.
It also urged them not to attack the police or to lob objects at them. “We need to do something that could really affect the government,” said Daniel Wong, a 21-year-old student. “Don’t let them have the idea that they can ignore us because we’re just sitting down.” The police continued their charge, pushing demonstrators out of a park and across a pedestrian bridge over the main protest area, where jittery crowds ran back and forth. It was the police’s deepest incursion into the protest camp since the occupation began.
In mid-October, the government offices and a nearby traffic tunnel and park became a battleground between the police and protesters who blockaded the chief executive’s office, which sits near Victoria Harbor. Hundreds of police officers used pepper spray to disperse hundreds of demonstrators who had barricaded Lung Wo Road near the chief executive’s office.
The two student groups at the forefront of the protests, the Hong Kong Federation of Students and Scholarism, had urged supporters to congregate in Admiralty and bring the now-familiar paraphernalia of the protest: safety helmets and drinking water, as well as goggles and umbrellas, which have been used to fend off bursts of pepper spray from the police.
“It’s been two months and we’ve had no response from the government,” said Norma Wong, a 29-year-old graduate student in political science. “There’s a huge sentiment from everyone in the movement that we need to do something.”