With new laws and arrests, there has been limited reporting on Hong Kong’s pro-China “patriots” – the people who are now running and policing the city, as well as the ordinary citizens who openly support them. But the BBC has spent weeks interviewing Innes Tang, 60, a prominent self-described patriot.
He and his volunteers have taken screen grabs from social media of any activities or comments they believe could be in breach of the NSL.
He also established a hotline for tip-offs from the public and encouraged his online followers to share information on the people around them.
Nearly 100 individuals and organisations have been reported to the authorities by him and his followers, he says.
“Does reporting work? We wouldn’t do it if it didn’t,” Mr Tang says. “Many had cases opened by the police… with some resulting in jail terms.”
Mr Tang says he hasn’t investigated alleged law breakers himself, but simply reported incidents he thinks warrant scrutiny – describing it as “proper community-police co-operation”.
HONG KONG — Fourteen pro-democracy activists were convicted in Hong Kong’s biggest national security case on Thursday by a court that said their plan to effect change through an unofficial primary election would have undermined the government’s authority and created a constitutional crisis.
After a 2019 protest movement that filled the city’s streets with demonstrators, authorities have all but silenced dissent in Hong Kong through reduced public choice in elections, crackdowns on media and the Beijing-imposed security law under which the activists were convicted.
[…]
In a summary of the verdict distributed to media, the court said the election participants had declared they would use their legislative power to veto the budgets.
Under the city’s mini-constitution, the chief executive can dissolve the legislature if a budget cannot be passed but the leader would have to step down if the budget is again vetoed in the next legislature.
In the full, 319-page verdict, the judges approved by the government to oversee the case also said if the plan to veto bills would lead to the dissolution of the legislature, it meant “the implementation of any new government policies would be seriously hampered and essentially put to a halt.”
“The power and authority of both the Government and the Chief Executive would be greatly undermined,” the court said in the verdict. “In our view … that would create a constitutional crisis for Hong Kong.”
[…]
Observers said the subversion case illustrated how the security law is being used to crush the political opposition following huge anti-government protests in 2019. It also showed that Beijing’s promise to retain the former British colony’s Western-style civil liberties for 50 years when it returned to China in 1997 was becoming increasingly threadbare, they said.
But the Beijing and Hong Kong governments insisted the law has helped bring back stability to the city and that judicial independence was being protected. After the verdicts, Beijing voiced its support for the work of the city’s judicial and law enforcement officials, despite concerns from the West.
About 50 pro-democracy activists and politicians have reportedly been arrested in Hong Kong’s biggest crackdown since the introduction of a controversial national security law.
The arrests are said to be linked to an independently organised primary vote.
Officers are also understood to have searched the house of the detained democracy activist Joshua Wong, raided a law firm and pressed news outlets to hand over information.
It is unclear if these acts are linked.
Police have yet to comment on the various moves officially.
The Democratic Party’s Facebook page said the arrests were carried out under the security law imposed by Beijing on the territory last June in response to months of pro-democracy protests.
Among those detained are thought to be well-known opposition figures from both the Democratic Party and the Civic Party like James To, Lam Cheuk Ting, and Lester Shum.
Police have besieged a university campus in Hong Kong occupied by protesters who have been fighting back with arrows and petrol bombs.
Officers have warned that they could use live ammunition if protesters do not stop attacking them using such weapons.
A media liaison officer was earlier wounded in the leg with an arrow near the Polytechnic University (PolyU).
Months of anti-government protests have caused turmoil in the city.
The latest violence is however some of the worst the semi-autonomous Chinese territory has seen since the movement began. The police have become targets for radical demonstrators, who accuse them of excessive force.
Police have so far been responding to violence around the PolyU campus mostly with tear gas and water cannon.
A Hong Kong police officer shot a masked protester at point blank range in a shocking skirmish broadcast on Facebook Live on Monday morning.
The outbreak of violence happened at a blockaded junction in Sai Wan Ho during rush hour as a police officer attempted to arrest a masked man during a wild scuffle in the city’s 24th straight weekend of pro-democracy demonstrations.
Footage showed the policeman drawing his sidearm as a second man moved towards the officer in an attempt to liberate his comrade.
The protester appeared to take a swipe at the officer’s pistol and just moments later he opened fire, hitting the masked demonstrator in the torso.
As shrieks pierced the air, other demonstrators rushed at the officer who quickly fired another two rounds.
The masked demonstrator he had originally tried to collar broke free in the struggle but another man went to ground as the shots were fired.
The bill was supported by Republicans and Democrats and was passed by a “voice vote” in the House of Representatives, meaning a recorded vote was not needed.
“If America does not speak out for human rights in China because of commercial interest, then we lose all moral authority to speak out for human rights anyplace in the world,” said house speaker Nancy Pelosi.
Ben Ray Lujan, a Democrat, said: “The house just sent a strong message to the people of Hong Kong: we stand with you in the fight for democracy and justice.”
China’s President Xi Jinping has issued a stern warning against dissent as protests continue in Hong Kong, saying any attempt to divide China will end in “crushed bodies and shattered bones”.
His comments came during a state visit to Nepal on Sunday, China’s state broadcaster CCTV said.
HONG KONG (AP) — Furiously yelling “Wearing a mask is not a crime,” tens of thousands of masked protesters hit Hong Kong’s rain-drenched streets Sunday in defiance of a new ban on facial coverings. Riot police later swept in with volleys of tear gas and muscular arrests as peaceful rallies again degenerated into widespread violence and chaos in the semi-autonomous Chinese territory.
Instead of deterring rioting and calming anti-government demonstrations that have gripped the international trading hub for four months, the ban that criminalized the wearing of face masks at rallies only redoubled the determination of both peaceful marchers and more radical black-clad youths. The hard-liners again lobbed gasoline bombs and trashed subway stations and China-linked banks in the city.
For the first time in the crisis, men on the roof of one of the Chinese military’s barracks in Hong Kong raised a yellow banner warning protesters they were breaking the law when laser pointers were flashed at the building, according to video broadcast by Hong Kong media.
Police said masked rioters also attacked bystanders, including two men left unconscious after bloody beatings and a woman who took photos of rioting.
A massive peaceful march to the central business district — on streets spray-painted with the word “resist” and hemmed in by high-rises that echoed with protesters’ chants — came as Hong Kong’s High Court rejected a second effort to invalidate the mask ban.
HONG KONG, Sept 29 (Reuters) – Hong Kong protesters are to join a global “anti-totalitarianism rally” on Sunday, following another night of violent clashes with police after weeks of pro-democracy unrest in the Chinese-ruled city.
Police fired tear gas and water cannon on Saturday night to disperse protesters who threw petrol bombs and rocks, broke government office windows and blocked a key road near the local headquarters of China’s People’s Liberation Army.
A series of protests for and against the city’s Communist Party rulers in Beijing is planned ahead of the 70th anniversary of the People’s Republic on Tuesday, including at the consulate of former colonial power Britain.
Thousands, young and old, gathered peacefully on Saturday at a harbourside park to mark the fifth anniversary of the “Umbrella” pro-democracy movement which gridlocked streets for 79 days in 2014.
Then the violence began, following a pattern of the last few weeks.
Anti-government protesters have attacked the legislature, Beijing’s main Liaison Office, occupied the airport, thrown petrol bombs at police, vandalised metro stations and set street fires.
Police have responded with tear gas, water cannon, rubber bullets and occasional live rounds fired into the air.
The protesters are angry about what they see as creeping Chinese interference in Hong Kong, which returned to China in 1997 under a “one country, two systems” formula guaranteeing freedoms that are not enjoyed on the mainland.
Hong Kong police have used tear gas, rubber bullets and water cannon to disperse crowds as tens of thousands marched in the city, defying a ban.
Demonstrators lit fires, threw petrol bombs at riot police and attacked the parliament building.
An event to mark five years since Beijing ruled out fully democratic elections was banned in China’s special administrative region.
On Friday, several key pro-democracy activists and lawmakers were arrested.
The protest movement grew out of rallies against a controversial extradition bill – now suspended – which would have allowed criminal suspects to be sent to mainland China for trial.
An estimated 1.7 million people in Hong Kong – a quarter of the population – defied police orders to stage a peaceful march after a rally in a downtown park, after two months of increasingly violent clashes that have prompted severe warnings from Beijing and failed to win concessions from the city’s government.
Huge crowds filled Victoria Park on Sunday afternoon and spilled on to nearby streets, forcing police to block traffic in the area. Torrential rain came down an hour into the rally, turning the park into a sea of umbrellas. At the same time, protesters walked towards Central, the heart of Hong Kong’s business district, and surrounded government headquarters.
Hong Kong International Airport saw chaotic scenes on a second consecutive day of massive anti-government protests that have paralysed one of Asia’s key transport hubs.
Squads of riot police arrived shortly before midnight after thousands of demonstrators again flooded the terminal buildings during the day.
Flight departures were brought to a standstill amid scuffles.
At least three men were mobbed inside the airport by protesters.
They were said to be holding identity cards showing they were police officers from mainland China.
Hong Kong police have once again clashed with anti-government protesters as the city enters its 10th week of mass demonstrations and unrest.
Police fired tear gas across the city on Sunday night, including into an enclosed railway station.
In the Wan Chai district, petrol bombs and bricks were thrown at riot police who responded by charging at protesters with batons.
A number of people, including a police officer, were injured in the clashes.
Police were also filmed firing rubber bullets at close range inside a subway station, while other officers were seen beating people with batons on an escalator.
Two months of demonstrations sparked by a controversial extradition bill show no signs of abating, with both sides hardening their stance.
