Man stabs protesters in Hong Kong
Four men and a woman were injured when an attacker lashed out with a knife in the aftermath of pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong yesterday.
Hospital officials said two of the victims were in a critical condition.
The unnamed attacker, speaking the Mandarin dialect of mainland China, is thought to have unleashed the violence after becoming embroiled in a political argument with protesters in the Taikoo Shing district. According to Hong Kong television, a local politician named as Andrew Chiu Ka-yin had an ear partially bitten off when he tried to prevent the attacker fleeing. The man was then subdued and beaten by the protesters before being arrested by police.
The female victim told the South China Morning Post that he had produced a knife after getting into an argument about politics with her sister and her husband. According to the Hong Kong Free Press he was a Mandarin-speaking supporter of the Chinese regime.
Earlier, riot police directed water cannon fire at protesters and fired tear gas and rubber bullets after being attacked with petrol bombs, in the 22nd consecutive weekend of confrontations.
Police stifled much of the protests planned in seven places yesterday, blocking off assembly areas and dispersing crowds after tumultuous demonstrations on Saturday/Sunday.
However, small numbers of militant protesters wearing masks succeeded in causing disruption in several places on the New Territories as well as Hong Kong island.
Carrie Lam, the territory’s chief executive, will meet Han Zheng, China’s vice-premier, in Beijing on Wednesday.
On Saturday the protesters struck a symbolic blow by vandalising the office of China’s state news agency, Xinhua. They broke doors and windows and threw petrol bombs and paint in the building’s entrance.
A spokesman for Xinhua said: ‘‘The practice of the black rioters once again shows that stopping the violence and restoring order is Hong Kong’s most important and urgent task.’’
People’s Daily, the newspaper of the Chinese Communist Party, warned civil servants yesterday of the consequences of joining the protests.
‘‘There is no middle ground,’’ it said. ‘‘There will be only one end to those civil servants who join the ’black terror’. They will lose their careers and future."