HK police blow up homemade bomb as protests cleared

DPA, 20TH OCTOBER, 2019-Hong Kong police swept through a popular shopping district late Sunday afternoon, catching antigovernment protesters, tourists and ordinary residents up in a clearance operation that saw scores hit by tear gas and water cannon.

Bystanders could be seen fleeing the scene as dozens of police vehicles drove down a major thoroughfare in some of the densest neighbourhoods in the world, mowing down protester barricades as tactical and riot police ran alongside.

On Sunday protesters dispersed for more than a kilometre through a web of historic side streets, setting up multiple fronts against police and vandalising businesses with links to China.

Police deployed a special robot to blow up a suspected bomb in a controlled explosion around 6:25 pm (1025 GMT). While explosives have not been widely used in Hong Kong’s protests, another small homemade bomb was spotted by police at a demonstration last week.

Hong Kong entered its twentieth straight week of protest on Sunday, which show no sign of stopping even as it has hit some setbacks. Protests began on June 9 against a legislative bill that would have allowed for residents to be extradited to mainland China.

While the bill has been formally withdrawn by leader Carrie Lam, the protest movement has set off a wave of anger with the government amid fears the former British colony is losing its autonomy, promised until 2047, to China.

Sunday marked one of the largest anti-government protests in recent weeks after numbers fell following a ban on face masks at demonstrations and disruption of subway services for much of the past month.