Hong Kong girded for another mass march against a China-backed extradition bill scheduled for tomorrow as Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam (林鄭月娥) faced new calls to withdraw the bill after clashes between protesters and police.
The Civil Human Rights Front, which organized a demonstration that drew hundreds of thousands of people last weekend, said that it had applied for police permission to stage a similar event.
The move comes as allies of Lam began questioning her tactics and lawmakers postponed debate on the bill until at least next week.
Photo: AFP
Yesterday, one of Lam’s top advisers said that her administration underestimated the amount of opposition to the bill, casting doubt on whether the bill could be rushed through before the end of the legislative session next month.
“I think it is impossible to discuss under such confrontation. It’s highly difficult,” Hong Kong Executive Council Convener Bernard Chan (陳智思) said on Hong Kong’s RTHK radio. “At least these days, we shouldn’t intensify such confrontation.”
While only a few protesters were near the legislature yesterday, Lam called off an appearance at a technology conference organized by the Wall Street Journal, organizers said.
“So far everybody is very unhappy with the way the government handled it,” Felix Chung (鍾國斌), who represents the textile and garments industries as a pro-establishment member of the Hong Kong Legislative Council, said in a telephone interview. “I believe most people in Hong Kong do not agree with the reasons why it has to be that rushed.”
Police had not yet responded to the front’s request for a permit to march from Victoria Park in the Tin Hau area about 3km to the government headquarters.
The group said that it does not see any reason why police should refuse their request because their events have been peaceful.
Critics say that passing the bill could prompt the US to reconsider the territory’s special trading status, drive away foreign companies and imperil critics of the Chinese Communist Party.
Hong Kong’s General Chamber of Commerce, which says it represents businesses employing one-third of the local workforce, said that large-scale protests show that the public has “serious apprehensions” about the bill.
“We sincerely urge the government to continue to listen to stakeholders and engage in meaningful dialogue with the public,” chamber chairman Aron Harilela said in a statement, adding that it agrees with the underlying principle of the bill.
“We call for restraint from all parties to ensure that this issue will not undermine business confidence in Hong Kong and our international reputation,” chamber chief executive officer Shirley Yuen added.
The government headquarters was closed yesterday, but several main roads were reopened.
Hong Kong Police Commissioner Stephen Lo (盧偉聰) said that officers had acted in accordance with guidelines on Wednesday and had shot 150 rounds of tear gas at protesters.
Lo added that 22 police had been injured.
Chung said that opponents of the bill were exaggerating its pitfalls, and protections were added to safeguard against misuse.
The statements by foreign governments questioning the bill have only fueled Beijing’s resolve to pass it , even though “it’s not such a big deal to delay it or make amendments,” he said.
“Now it’s been raised to an international, diplomatic level,” Chung said. “That is why the central government and Hong Kong are standing so firm on this bill now.”
‘BARBAROUS ACTS’: The captain of the fishing vessel said that people in checkered clothes beat them with iron bars and that he fell unconscious for about an hour Ten Vietnamese fishers were violently robbed in the South China Sea, state media reported yesterday, with an official saying the attackers came from Chinese-flagged vessels. The men were reportedly beaten with iron bars and robbed of thousands of dollars of fish and equipment on Sunday off the Paracel Islands (Xisha Islands, 西沙群島), which Taiwan claims, as do Vietnam, China, Brunei, Malaysia and the Philippines. Vietnamese media did not identify the nationalities of the attackers, but Phung Ba Vuong, an official in central Quang Ngai province, told reporters: “They were Chinese, [the boats had] Chinese flags.” Four of the 10-man Vietnamese crew were rushed
STICKING TO DEFENSE: Despite the screening of videos in which they appeared, one of the defendants said they had no memory of the event A court trying a Frenchman charged with drugging his wife and enlisting dozens of strangers to rape her screened videos of the abuse to the public on Friday, to challenge several codefendants who denied knowing she was unconscious during their actions. The judge in the southern city of Avignon had nine videos and several photographs of the abuse of Gisele Pelicot shown in the courtroom and an adjoining public chamber, involving seven of the 50 men accused alongside her husband. Present in the courtroom herself, Gisele Pelicot looked at her telephone during the hour and a half of screenings, while her ex-husband
Scientists yesterday announced a milestone in neurobiological research with the mapping of the entire brain of an adult fruit fly, a feat that might provide insight into the brains of other organisms and even people. The research detailed more than 50 million connections between more than 139,000 neurons — brain nerve cells — in the insect, a species whose scientific name is Drosophila melanogaster and is often used in neurobiological studies. The research sought to decipher how brains are wired and the signals underlying healthy brain functions. It could also pave the way for mapping the brains of other species. “You might
PROTESTS: A crowd near Congress waved placards that read: ‘How can we have freedom without education?’ and: ‘No peace for the government’ Argentine President Javier Milei has made good on threats to veto proposed increases to university funding, with the measure made official early yesterday after a day of major student-led protests. Thousands of people joined the demonstration on Wednesday in defense of the country’s public university system — the second large-scale protest in six months on the issue. The law, which would have guaranteed funding for universities, was criticized by Milei, a self-professed “anarcho-capitalist” who came to power vowing to take a figurative chainsaw to public spending to tame chronically high inflation and eliminate the deficit. A huge crowd packed a square outside Congress
RSS