Small groups of pro-democracy demonstrators remained on Hong Kong’s streets yesterday, after protest leaders agreed to talks with the government and some students returned to school for exams.
Talks between the government and student leaders are progressing at a snail’s pace, although even protest leaders are now acutely worried that further disruption could alienate supporters.
The mass protests for fully free elections have brought parts of the territory to a standstill for more than a week and while many remain supportive of the movement, they also want to resume their daily lives.
Photo: Reuters
A second round of “preparatory talks” was held late on Monday night in a bid to set conditions for formal negotiations. Students had already agreed to talks with Hong Kong Chief Secretary Carrie Lam (林鄭月娥), but called them off on Friday after what they described as “organized attacks” on protesters at the Mong Kok demonstration site.
Yet a Hong Kong delegate to China’s National People’s Congress said the protests could not overturn Beijing’s August decision to vet candidates for the territory’s 2017 leadership elections.
“I don’t see why the National People’s Congress Standing Committee would change its decision... It was a nationwide decision and the decision has to face the country’s 1.3 billion people,” Rita Fan (范徐麗泰) told reporters.
Yesterday was another day of traffic mayhem, with diversions causing jams and commuter frustration, and the reopening of primary schools adding to the chaos.
The few protesters that remain are still determined to make their point, though unsure of the result.
“To be honest, I don’t have confidence that we can succeed, but whether we succeed or not, I am giving my best. I also learned that we can speak out when it is needed,” said Dickson Yeung, 20.
Demonstrator numbers grew throughout the day, but remained low at protest sites as well as outside the central government offices. Yet despite dwindling crowds, today’s opening of the Legislative Council was postponed to next week.
“I am not assured that there is a quiet and safe environment in the surroundings for a meeting to be held,” Legislative Council President Jasper Tsang (曾鈺成) said.
Pro-democracy lawmakers slammed the cancelation.
“You can’t dodge it forever. Even if you postpone it for three weeks, public anger will not go away,” Civic Party leader Alan Leong (梁家傑) told reporters.
A global survey showed that 60 percent of Taiwanese had attained higher education, second only to Canada, the Ministry of the Interior said. Taiwan easily surpassed the global average of 43 percent and ranked ahead of major economies, including Japan, South Korea and the US, data from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) for 2024 showed. Taiwan has a high literacy rate, data released by the ministry showed. As of the end of last year, Taiwan had 20.617 million people aged 15 or older, accounting for 88.5 percent of the total population, with a literacy rate of 99.4 percent, the data
NEW LOW: The council in 2024 based predictions on a pessimistic estimate for the nation’s total fertility rate of 0.84, but last year that rate was 0.69, 17 percent lower An expected National Development Council (NDC) report expects the nation’s population to drop below 12 million by 2065, with the old-age dependency ratio to top 100 percent sooner than 2070, sources said yesterday. The council is slated to release its latest population projections in August, using an ultra-low fertility model, the sources said. The previous report projected that Taiwan’s population would fall to 14.37 million by 2070, but based on a new estimate of the total fertility rate (TFR) — the average number of children born to a woman over her lifetime — the population is expected to reach 12 million by
INTENSIFYING THREATS: Beijing’s tactics include massive attacks on the government service network, aircraft and naval vessel incursions and damaging undersea cables China is prepared to interfere in November’s nine-in-one local elections by launching massive attacks on the Taiwanese government’s service network (GSN), a report published by the National Security Bureau showed. The report was submitted to the Legislative Yuan ahead of the bureau’s scheduled briefing at the Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee tomorrow. The national security team has identified about 13,000 suspicious Internet accounts and 860,000 disputed messages, the bureau said of China’s cognitive warfare against Taiwan. The disputed messages focus on major foreign affairs, national defense and economic issues, which were produced using generative artificial intelligence (AI) and distributed through Chinese
COUNTERING HOSTILITY: The draft bill would require the US to increase diplomatic pressure on China and would impose sanctions on those who sabotage undersea cable networks US lawmakers on Thursday introduced a bipartisan bill to bolster the resilience of Taiwan’s submarine cables to counter China’s hostile activities. The proposal, titled the critical undersea infrastructure resilience initiative act, was cosponsored by Republican representatives Mike Lawler and Greg Stanton, and Democratic Representative Dave Min. US Senators John Curtis and Jacky Rosen also introduced a companion bill in the US Senate, which has passed markup at the chamber’s Committee on Foreign Relations. The House’s version of the bill would prioritize the deployment of sensors to detect disruptions or potential sabotage in real-time and enhance early warning capabilities through global intelligence sharing frameworks,
RSS