Flights have resumed at Hong Kong’s airport
Disruptions were marked by attacks on two men
HONG KONG — Flights resumed at Hong Kong’s airport this morning after two days of disruptions marked by attacks on two men. The confrontation is highlighting the hardening positions of prodemocracy protesters and the authorities in the Chinese city, which is a major international travel hub.
A mass demonstration and the violence forced more than 100 flight cancellations Tuesday, but check-in counters were open and flights appeared to be operating normally today.
About three dozen protesters camped in the airport’s arrivals area. They spread pamphlets and posters across the floor in a section of the terminal but were not accosting travelers.
A statement from the airport’s management said it had obtained “an interim injunction to restrain persons from unlawfully and willfully obstructing or interfering” with airport operations. It said an area of the airport had been set aside for demonstrations, and no protests would be allowed outside the designated area.
Hong Kong police said that on Tuesday they arrested five people for unlawful assembly, assaulting police officers and possessing weapons.
More than 700 protesters have been arrested in total since early June, mostly men in their 20s and 30s, but also including women, teenagers and septuagenarians.
The airport disruptions escalated a summer of demonstrations aimed at what many Hong Kong residents see as an increasing erosion of the freedoms they were promised in 1997 when Communist Party-ruled mainland China took over what had been a British colony.
The black-clad demonstrators have shown no sign of letting up on their campaign to force Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam’s administration to respond to their demands, including that she step down and scrap proposed legislation under which some suspects could be sent to mainland China, where, critics say, they could face torture and unfair or politically charged trials.
Lam has rejected calls for dialogue, saying Tuesday the protesters were threatening to push their home into an “abyss.”
The central government in Beijing has ominously characterized the current protest movement as something approaching “terrorism” that poses an “existential threat” to citizens.
The airport protest has had a direct impact on business travel and tourism. Analysts said it could make foreign investors think twice about Hong Kong, which has long prided itself as being Asia’s leading business city, with convenient regional air links.