Hong Kong pro-democracy protests that brought tens of thousands onto the streets last week dwindled to a few hundred yesterday after activist leaders agreed to talks with the government which are all but certain to go nowhere.
The student-led protests have calmed since clashes with police more than a week ago and the number of protesters calling for universal suffrage has fallen dramatically since violent scuffles broke out at the weekend between demonstrators and pro-China opponents.
Tomorrow’s talks will focus on “the basis for political development,” the government said, referring to plans for the 2017 chief executive election, but it was unclear how discussions could reconcile such polarized positions.
Protesters called on the Hong Kong Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying (梁振英) to step down and any breakdown in the talks is widely expected to trigger another cycle of protests.
China’s “one country, two systems” formula specifies universal suffrage as an eventual goal, but Beijing ruled on Aug. 31 that it would screen candidates who want to run in 2017, which the democracy activists said rendered universal suffrage meaningless.
“‘One country, two systems’ has made great contributions to Hong Kong’s prosperity and stability and has garnered broad international approval,” Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Li Baodong (李保東) told reporters yesterday. “We have always opposed outside forces interfering in Hong Kong’s internal affairs and China’s internal politics.”
Meanwhile, in Beijing, relatives of the detained said yesterday that police apprehended poet Wang Zang (王藏) and seven others ahead of a poetry reading planned in the Chinese capital to support the protesters in Hong Kong.
Police apprehended poet Wang in front of his Beijing home on Oct. 1 and then searched his apartment and confiscated a computer, a router and other materials, said his wife, Wang Li (王麗).
On Sept. 30, Wang Zang posted on Twitter a picture of himself raising his middle finger and holding an umbrella, a symbol of solidarity adopted by the Hong Kong protesters.
A message over the picture read: “Wearing black clothes, bald and holding an umbrella, I support Hong Kong.”
Wang Zang had been scheduled to speak at an Oct. 2 poetry reading in Beijing’s Songzhuang art district billed to support Hong Kong protesters.
According to relatives, police apprehended seven others on their way to the event, which never started, and were being held at the Beijing No. 1 Detention Center for seeking to disturb public order.
Wang Li said she had not heard from her husband since his detention.
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