‘Violence is harmful, it won’t solve divisions’

Businesses, railways re-open

HONG KONG, Sept 16, (Agencies): Hong Kong’s government reiterated that violence is not the solution after an unapproved march descended into chaos with police firing tear gas and water cannons after demonstrators lobbed Molotov cocktails at government buildings, blocked traffic and set fires.

The government in a statement late Sunday said violence would only harm the community and it was sincerely trying to solve problems.

Thousands of people, black-clad masked protesters alongside families with children, defied a police ban and peacefully marched 2 kilometers (1.2 miles) from the Causeway Bay shopping district to the central business district, making continuous calls for democratic reforms. Police had turned down the march permit, but the demonstrators were undeterred, as they have been all summer.

Some protesters later burned Chinese flags and vandalized subway stations. Hundreds of them targeted the government office complex, throwing bricks and gasoline bombs through police barriers. Police responded by firing volleys of tear gas and using water cannon trucks to spray pepperlaced water as well as blue liquid that helped them identify offenders. Protesters retreated but regrouped in cat-and-mouse battles lasting a few hours before calm returned.

Pro-Beijing supporters turned up at the North Point and Fortress Hill neighborhoods late Sunday, leading to brawls. Police in a statement Monday said people used iron hammers and other weapons to attack each other, leading to a number of injuries and forcing police to deploy tear gas.

Police also said “radical protesters escalated their violent acts” by throwing petrol bombs at police officers and vowed to step up enforcement. In one case, it said protesters hurled petrol bombs at two police officers, who were forced to withdraw pistols as a warning to disperse them.

The anti-government protests have taken place since June and increasingly have been marked by violence and clashes with police. The movement was sparked by an extradition bill many Hong Kong residents see as an example of the territory’s autonomy being eroded under Chinese rule.

The government’s decision to withdraw the bill was seen by the protesters as too little, too late. Their demands have grown to calls for greater democracy and police accountability, and some of the more confrontational protesters defend violence as necessary since peaceful demonstrations haven’t effected change.

More than 1,300 people have been arrested amid the increasing clashes between protesters and police.

The unrest has battered Hong Kong’s economy, which was already reeling from the U.S.-China trade war. It is also seen as an embarrassment to Beijing, which has accused foreign powers of fomenting the unrest.

Protesters have vowed to keep up their protests ahead of the Oct. 1 celebration of the China’s ruling Communist Party’s 70th year in in power. The Civil Human Rights Front, whose permit for the Sunday march was denied, plans new rallies on Sept. 28 and Oct. 1.

Eric Lai, coordinator for the group that planned several previous rallies that drew massive crowds, said police banned its rallies to silence peaceful protesters but it only led to more anger.

“Dialogue is meaningless if the government refuses to respond to the people’s demands,” he added.

Meanwhile, Hong Kong’s businesses and underground rail stations re-opened as usual on Monday morning, after a chaotic Sunday that saw police fire water cannon, tear gas and rubber bullets at protesters who blocked roads and threw petrol bombs outside government headquarters.

Thousands of anti-government protesters, many clad in black masks, caps and shades to obscure their identity, had raced through the streets, engaged in cat-and-mouse tactics with police, setting street fires and blocking roads in the heart of the former British colony where many key business districts are located.

Authorities moved quickly to douse the fires and police fired volleys of tear gas to disperse them, including in the bustling shopping and tourist district of Causeway Bay.

Police issued a statement early on Monday expressing “severe condemnation” after what began as a mostly peaceful protest had spiralled into violence in some of the Chinese territory’s key business, shopping and tourist districts.

Democratic lawmaker Ted Hui was arrested for allegedly obstructing the police, according to his Democratic Party’s Facebook page, as he tried to mediate on the streets in North Point.

Around 20 “radical protesters” had attacked two police officers on Sunday evening, hurling petrol bombs, bricks, and threatening the safety of the officers, the statement said.

The demonstrations were the latest in over three months of sometimes violent protests, with protesters angered by what they see as creeping interference by Beijing in Hong Kong’s affairs despite promises by Beijing to grant the city wide-ranging autonomy and freedoms denied in mainland China.

The initial trigger for the protests was a contentious extradition bill, now withdrawn, that would have allowed people to be sent to mainland China for trial.

The protests have since broadened into other demands including universal suffrage and an independent inquiry into allegations of excessive force by the police.

At least 18 people were injured, three of them seriously, during Sunday’s violence, according to the Hospital Authority.

Nearly 1400 people have been arrested since the protests started in June, but police gave no update on the number arrested over the weekend.

The protests have weighed on the city’s economy as it faces its first recession in a decade, with tourist arrivals plunging 40 percent in August amid some disruptions at the city’s international airport.

By Sunday evening, the running battles between antigovernment protesters and police had spilled into street brawls between rival groups in the districts of Fortress Hill and North Point further east on Hong Kong island, where men in white T-shirts, believed to be pro-Beijing supporters, some wielding hammers, rods and knives, clashed with anti-government activists.

On a street close to North Point, home to a large pro-Beijing community, a Reuters witness saw one man in a white T-shirt sprawled on the ground with head wounds.

Ted Hui