The full story of the Hong Kong protests: why this is not over
After 2 million, which is 28% of the Hong Kong population, took to the streets on 16thJune, some colleagues, especially those who do not read Chinese, congratulated me for the impressive result. This is when I realize that, most people, especially the English speaking world, may not have been exposed to enough information on Hong Kong, and could have been misled into believing that the protesters have won and life can now resume to normal. In fact, this is far from being the case.
We had four demands on 16thJune:
1. Withdraw the bill, not suspend
2. Government must admit 12thJune incident was not a riot and release the protesters arrested on 12thJune
3. Police to admit their responsibility for the violence on 12thJune
4. Carrie Lam to step down as CE
Carrie Lam convened a press conference on 18thJune. We were all waiting for her to at least respond to one or two of those demands. But that never happened. Except reiterating her apology for not handling the process of the bill well enough, which we’ve already heard several days ago, she answered all questions with “I’ve answered already” (when she clearly had not), “this will be the responsibility of the Police”, or “you are free to make your complaint within the existing mechanisms”.
In conclusion, 2 million people have spent almost a whole day expressing clearly their demands, we’ve lost one life (a protester jumped from a building and passed away on 15thJune with “no extradition” being his last message), yet we have no concrete answer, no apology for violence, no stepping down, nothing.
You may have started learning about what’s happening in Hong Kong when you see impressive pictures of the peaceful protests. But what happened before, between and after, may not have been covered in such detail in English media, but are actually even more important. We hope, by understanding what REALLY happened, everyone, including the international community, would understand why we cannot retreat. Not just yet.
Government backed down. Or have they?
On 15thJune, Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor announced that “the Government has decided to suspend the legislative amendment exercise, restart our communication with all sectors of the society, do more explanation work and listen to different views of the society.” However, in Chinese, the word “暫緩”, meaning “pause”, “delay”, “postpone” was used.
Why is “suspend” not equal to “withdraw”?
“Withdraw” in Legislative Council context means a total withdrawal, meaning that in order to enact the bill, she would have to start from scratch, from first reading, to setting up a dedicated committee to discuss the clauses in depth, to second reading and then to third and final reading. By “suspending” at second reading stage, she is still keeping the possibility of skipping the most tedious and lengthy processes when she eventually brings it up again in the future (perhaps when the majority of the population start forgetting about this?).
What happened before that: Ugly fast track process
Prior to suspending, the bill had gone through first reading and was in the process of setting up the dedicated committee, when legislators from the pro-government camp started meddling against the constitution by secretly circulating a resolution within themselves (but not to the democrats) to revoke the chairman. According to the Legislative Council (“LegCo”) rules, the default chairman has to be the most senior LegCo member in the room, that is James To Kun-sun, who is from the pan-democratic camp. The circulation of the resolution by the pro-government camp to revoke James To’s chairmanship resulted in a bizarre scene where two different meetings were held inside the Legco, chaired by two different chairmen, at the same time, both declaring their own meeting the legitimate one. This eventually resulted in fist-fights whereby several Legco members were slightly injured and one was even hospitalized. Even Wong Wang Fat, previous Chairman of the Legco, openly spoke to media that according to his understanding of the rules, James To is the only legitimate chairman according to the rules and the meeting chaired by James To is the only legitimate meeting.
But shortly following this incident, Carrie Lam announced that she will skip the dedicated committee altogether and go straight to the second reading. Convenient, yes, but legit, no.
From peace to “riot”
You would have known by now that the protest against the bill on 9thJune of 1.03 million people was very peaceful. So peaceful to an extent that the CE Carrie Lam issued a statement at 11pm that very day to reiterate that the second reading of the bill would go ahead nevertheless, basically telling 1.03 million people that “I heard you, but I don’t care”. The pan-democratic camp thus appealed to all supporters to go on strike on 12thJune.
A 5-person riot, 150 tear gas bombs and 20 bean bag bullets
On 12thJune, 5 people were arrested and charged for rioting, which could end up with a maximum sentence of 10 years. This caused an uproar as it was estimated that 40,000 were at the protest, and though most would agree that some violence had been observed, it can hardly be called a “riot” as a matter of fact.
On 15thJune, the CE Carrie Lam was prompted with the question why the assembly was a riot. She referred it to Police’s judgment (and effectively shedding the responsibility to the Police). 2 million people took to the streets chanting “we are not rioters”, “release those arrested” again and again. On 17thJune, the Chief Commissioner of the Police clarified that he is “not trying to say the whole assembly is a riot”, and that “if your actions of protests were peaceful, you have nothing to worry about”, in effect trying to ease public concerns for being arrested for rioting, and acknowledging that most people there were in peaceful protest. But he insisted those who were arrested were indeed rioters. The “Riot 5” included students, and an elderly man who is suffering from third stage cancer.
However, it would seem his argument is illogical. Lawyers specializing in criminal law in Hong Kong observed that, according to the Public Order Ordinance, and confirmed by case law, all participants in an unlawful assembly which constitutes a riot, are all defined as rioters, as long as they are acting as a joint enterprise, despite they had not personally taken part in actions that would constitute a breach of the peace. So if the riot charges were not lifted for the 5 “rioters”, all 40,000 participants could potentially be found guilty of rioting too.
But what’s more interesting is how you would need to fire 150 tear gas bombs, 20 bean bag bullets and several rubber bullets for a riot of 5 people, leaving all wondering whether these 5 people had superpowers, warranting the use of such force to arrest them. Most of them, at the end, were arrested while seeking treatment in hospital.
Excessive violence by Police
Every time you start telling the Police that they had been excessively violent, they would tell you “but the protesters threw bricks”. Yes, some protesters threw bricks (yes I admit that’s dangerous). And umbrellas. And plastic bottles. And maybe a bunch of other stuff. But does that justify all the violence that had been applied on that day, at any moment, to anyone?
You have rubber bullets aimed straight at the head of someone who is clearly walking away from the Police after placing a blockage in front of him. You have 7 cops beat up a young guy with their batons, who was transporting a carton of water within a perfectly lawful zone (Footage: https://www.facebook.com/hkucampustv/videos/323960905189061/). People retreating to the MTR station, an enclosed space, were pepper sprayed. Against what we believed to be common practice, pepper spray was applied to people like pesticide on cockroaches. You have Police chasing people into a shopping mall, closing the MTR exits so that they couldn't leave, bolting the door, calling them "freedom cxnts" (Footage: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKVYB2LRACA&fbclid=IwAR15c2hOEyPyo3qBtE3Ditwc6ZV1EgrrJ0b3DGrZofx75wU7fbpfnvu_oeA), and releasing tear gas outside so that the gas seeps into the mall. You have foreign press asking Police not to shoot him because he is press, and getting the response “Press my axx” in Chinese （Footage: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1c1ni4K_GRU). I can write about this all day. But the Siege of CITIC is probably the worst.
Siege of CITIC
Footage:https://youtu.be/13eauJMTOkU
CITIC Tower is immediately adjacent to the Legco Complex, connected by a flyover. On 12thJune, CITIC Tower premises is defined as a lawful assembly area i.e. Police had issued a “notice of no objection” for the area. Masses gathering there included students, elderly, children, and also some Christians or newly converted Christians singing “Sing Hallelujah to the Lord”, the anthem of the movement.
At around 3:30pm on 12thJune, tear gas bombs were fired, first at Harcourt Road, where assembly was unlawful. Fair enough. Crowds started to escape, many towards CITIC Tower, the closest refuge. Not surprisingly, several doors on Lung Wui Road were locked and bolted already preventing masses flooding in. Crowds flocked in through a single door, luckily in an orderly manner despite gas is already flowing over from Harcourt Road. Surprisingly, the Police started firing tear gas bombs AT THE MIDDLE of the escaping crowd. Tear gas surrounded the crowd like a gas chamber. If the people hadn’t kept their calm and continue the orderly escape, this could possibly resulted in hundreds of deaths by stomping over each other.
From the footage it’s clear that the crowd was escaping and not creating any harm to the Police. The question now is, did the Police not want people to leave? Why are they still firing the bombs if the crowd is already leaving? Did the Police not foresee that this would result in grave danger? Were the Police actually trying to hurt the people on purpose? Just because some other protesters threw stuff at you earlier in the day?
No Police badge on Raptors
By “Raptors” we certainly don’t mean the newly crowned NBA champions. “Raptors” is the name for a specialized team of Police trained for special purposes. They received special training, are armed differently, and most importantly, are anonymous. There are no Police badges or identification numbers on their uniforms, and thus if you are to make any complaint about any Raptor, you can’t even quote who it was.
When confronted with this question, Chief of the Security Bureau Li Ka Chiu replied “they are wearing a specially designed uniform, there is no space to exhibit the Police identification number”. No space. Wow. OK. When you have enough space to exhibit a number on swimsuits of beauty pageant candidates, you don’t have enough space to exhibit a Police identification number on your full geared uniform.
If certain Police officers had breached the code of conduct, they should be tried for it. If they had not, then something is wrong with the code of conduct and also how they are educated in police school. All this violence has created irreversible mistrust between citizens and the Police. If Police do not admit any wrongdoings on the day, this issue is bound to come back again and again and again.
Carrie Lam not stepping down
This is probably ranked lowest in priority as we have no vote over who be CE, and it would not make much difference if someone replaced Carrie Lam.
But here you go, in a nutshell why we have won nothing yet, and why the fight must continue. The Joint Association of Universities has announced that they have set a deadline for government to respond to our demands by 20thJune, otherwise they may escalate. It’s tiring and exhausting, not to mention dangerous. We certainly don’t do it for fun. But if we can’t rescue the folks now sitting in jail and awaiting the trial for riot, we can’t stop here.
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