Activists pull off Hong Kong election win

HANGZHOU, CHINA • After seven busy days in China, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau arrives Tuesday in Hong Kong for a visit that comes at a tumultuous time in the territory’s politics.

A group of young Hong Kong pro-democracy activists pulled off a stunning election victory, setting the stage for a new round of political confrontations with Beijing, official results showed Monday.

The candidates, who helped lead massive 2014 pro-democracy street protests, will now seek a vote on changing the way the city is governed, but they’ll face resistance from Beijing, which rejects separatism.

The election, the first since the “yellow umbrella” street protests, had the highest turnout since Britain turned Hong Kong over to the Chinese in 1997.

“It shows how Hong Kong people want to change,” said Nathan Law, a 23-year-old former student protest leader. “People are voting for a new way and new future of our democratic movement.”

The results are a sign “that Hong Kong people want to resist,” said another surprise winner, Sixtus “Baggio” Leung, 30. “This is what Beijing should know.”

Under the principle of “one country, two systems” and the Basic Law constitution, Beijing is supposed to let Hong Kong keep its capitalist economic and political system separate from mainland China’s until 2047.

The youth movement represents a break with the mainstream “pan-democrat” parties, who have not challenged the idea that Hong Kong is part of China.

Final results showed that overall, pro-democracy candidates won 30 of 70 seats in the Legislative Council, three more than previously, which means they retain the power to block government attempts to enact unpopular or controversial legislation, such as a Beijingbacked revamp of how the city’s top leader is chosen that sparked the 2014 protests.