Campus violence against mainland students condemned
The liaison office of the central government in Hong Kong and the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) on Sunday strongly condemned recent campus violence targeting mainland students, with the school vowing to punish blackclad protesters who allegedly attacked and beat a student from the Chinese mainland with an umbrella last week.
In an open letter to mainland students in Hong Kong, the liaison office of the central government in the city condemned school violence targeting mainland students, and vowed to promptly follow up on the case and offer help.
The office asked the students to keep calm, pay attention to safety and focus on study. They should report to the school and keep in touch with the office if encountering any difficulty.
On Wednesday evening, a mainland student was attacked by blackclad rioters in the HKUST campus.
“After the event, we have seen many video recordings of the entire incident including the deliberate and totally unacceptable assault and battery on our students. We want to reiterate that no violence on our campus will be tolerated and we strongly condemn this attack,” the university said in an announcement published on its official WeChat account on Sunday.
The school said it is seeking external professional help to more effectively collect and review all of the available evidence to identify those responsible for the violence and those deliberately shielding the violence from view and who among them were HKUST students.
It vowed to impose appropriate punishment on the attackers and those who assisted them, adding it will still pursue appropriate legal action even if those responsible are not HKUST students.
The school said much of its campus had been vandalized and classes remained cancelled on Monday.
Tang Fei, a member of the Council of the Chinese Association of Hong Kong and Macao Studies, told the Global Times that the response, although a little late, was a timely one in current situation, which clearly states its stance and vows to cooperate with police, adding that he is not optimistic about the result as the investigation is based on CCTV footage, not the crime scene.
“The anti-mainland atmosphere will scare mainland students and turn colleges into a nest or breeding ground for hyping hatred,” Tang said
Application agents in the mainland estimated that the number of mainland students going to Hong Kong colleges in 2020 would decline by 5 to 10 percent, media reported.