Dozens of people in Hong Kong yesterday were charged with taking part in a riot after a dispute between vendors and police on the first day of the Lunar New Year holiday blew up into territory’s worst violence since pro-democracy protests in 2014.
Sixty-four people have been arrested in connection with the Monday night violence that saw protesters hurl bricks at police and set fire to trash cans in Mong Kok, a working-class neighborhood. Thirty-seven were charged yesterday.
More than 130 people were wounded in the clashes.
Photo: AP
The violence has compounded a sense of unease since an “Occupy Central” pro-democracy movement in late 2014 that saw thousands of protesters block major roads, including in Mong Kok, to demand Chinese Communist Party leaders allow full democracy in the territory.
At least one of those charged, Edward Leung Tin-kei (梁天琦), belongs to a group called Hong Kong Indigenous, one of a cluster of outspoken groups calling for greater Hong Kong autonomy and even independence from China.
Leung has been planning to contest a by-election for the Hong Kong Legislative Council.
The head of the University of Hong Kong student union, Billy Fung (馮敬恩), said three of its students were also in court. Students from the university were at the forefront of the 2014 protests.
Thirty-eight people — 35 men and three women aged between 15 and 70 — were charged with participating in a “riot,” the police said in a statement.
The 15-year-old is due to appear in a juvenile court today.
The defendants, who appeared one after another, including one with a bandage on his head, were granted bail and ordered to stay away from areas where the clashes took place. The next hearing will be on April 7, following a request by prosecutors to allow authorities time to gather evidence.
CHAOS: Iranians took to the streets playing celebratory music after reports of Khamenei’s death on Saturday, while mourners also gathered in Tehran yesterday Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was killed in a major attack on Iran launched by Israel and the US, throwing the future of the Islamic republic into doubt and raising the risk of regional instability. Iranian state television and the state-run IRNA news agency announced the 86-year-old’s death early yesterday. US President Donald Trump said it gave Iranians their “greatest chance” to “take back” their country. The announcements came after a joint US and Israeli aerial bombardment that targeted Iranian military and governmental sites. Trump said the “heavy and pinpoint bombing” would continue through the week or as long
An Emirates flight from Dubai arrived at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport yesterday afternoon, the first service of the airline since the US and Israel launched strikes against Iran on Saturday. Flight EK366 took off from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) at 3:51am yesterday and landed at 4:02pm before taxiing to the airport’s D6 gate at Terminal 2 at 4:08pm, data from the airport and FlightAware, a global flight tracking site, showed. Of the 501 passengers on the flight, 275 were Taiwanese, including 96 group tour travelers, the data showed. Tourism Administration Deputy Director-General Huang He-ting (黃荷婷) greeted Taiwanese passengers at the airport and
State-run CPC Corp, Taiwan (CPC, 台灣中油) yesterday said that it had confirmed on Saturday night with its liquefied natural gas (LNG) and crude oil suppliers that shipments are proceeding as scheduled and that domestic supplies remain unaffected. The CPC yesterday announced the gasoline and diesel prices will rise by NT$0.2 and NT$0.4 per liter, respectively, starting Monday, citing Middle East tensions and blizzards in the eastern United States. CPC also iterated it has been reducing the proportion of crude oil imports from the Middle East and diversifying its supply sources in the past few years in response to geopolitical risks, expanding
PLANE HIT: The Israeli military said it shot down an Iranian Air Force fighter over Tehran, while an Iranian warship sank off Sri Lanka, with no cause known The US and Israel yesterday hit Iran’s capital and other cities in multiple airstrikes on the fifth day of the war with Iran. Israel targeted the Iranian leadership and security forces, while the Islamic Republic responded with missile barrages and drone attacks on Israel, and across the region. Tehran residents woke to dawn blasts and Iranian state television showed the ruins of building in the center of the capital. The Shiite seminary city of Qom and multiple other cities were also targeted. With fighter jets roaring overhead, those still in Tehran looked anxiously to the skies. One man, who ran a clothing shop,
RSS