Hong Kong Protests Live Updates: Police Violence Puts Government on Defensive | Hacker News Reader

Hong Kong Protests Live Updates: Police Violence Puts Government on Defensive

nytimes.com

179 pointsishikawa106 comments

This was an inevitable conclusion, I grew up in Hong Kong and we left in 1996 during the handover along with many other ex-pats. We saw the writing on the wall as did many others based on how horrible the handover was going. It is a true shame what is happening to Hong Kong now but I don't see China relenting to pressure as that would only embolden other cities to do similar protests. I worry for my friends who are still there as the only way this is going to end is in a continued escalation of violence. As someone who visited Tiananmen Square in the early 90s, it was amazing how quickly the country moved on and refused to discuss it. I worry that is what is going to happen in HK.

The ability to suppress discussion/political action in response to such a significant event (such as Tiananmen Square) would seem more difficult now with ubiquitous cameras.

Many records can be made, but can they also be shared widely enough to maintain political pressure? Maybe not, if the population is dependent on government controlled internet infrastructure. This makes Starlink more interesting. How do you prevent your population from using foreign built satellite internet if that country should choose to make it freely available to your citizens? Do you simply lose control? Do you try to rebuild/force roll out a proprietary, non-interoperable telecommunications system?

After seeing the impact of telecommunications and social media propaganda on recent world events (for instance, the Arab Spring) - I’m sure there are smart people thinking about how to plug populations into the internet against the desires of the home country. Satellite based internet seems like an obvious solution, but maybe it’s not even as complicated as that.

Hate to be "that guy", but public blockchain technologies are another strong tool that people have for resisting censorship [0]. It's much, much harder to nullroute blockchain traffic as opposed to nullrouting a website with information you want to censor. It's also very clear that the CCP is afraid of such technologies [1]

The rub is of course, this censorship-resistance being predicated on the consensus mechanism of a blockchain not being concentrated in one country.

[0]: https://theconversation.com/chinese-internet-users-turn-to-t...

[1]: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-blockchain/china-im...

>> Do you try to rebuild/force roll out a proprietary, non-interoperable telecommunications system?

Honestly can see that happening. It's happened in the past for economic reasons, no reason why a government wouldn't force it for political reasons. It would be a natural progression from filtering.

This is something I've always been confused about- what's the difference between an "expat" and an "economic immigrant"? Is it just the origin country or color of skin?

Expat supposedly not staying and not called the place home.

Immigrant is really moving in.

You add the economic adj the response is by another - expat has money ei no

I think it is also about how rich you are? (Coming from an expat/economic immigrant)

I think it also hinges on the degree to which someone cuts ties with one's country of origin. "Expat" implies continued ties to a homeland, whereas "immigrant" implies an intent to turn the new place of residence into one's new home. There are obviously exceptions and blurred lines there, but that seems to be what I've observed.

Expat says nothing about why a person is living somewhere other than their homeland.

Legal status in the country also probably, economic migrant is a euphemism

euphemism for what?

It's a word that immigrants use so they can continue to hate immigrants.

Or at the very least distinguish themselves from the immigrants everyone else hates.

The only thing that can serve to enforce the Joint Declaration (and similar bi-lateral agreements between countries) is if the signatories uphold and maintain their expectations of the other.

For the last two decades, China has been testing for any response on the part of the British to encroachments on HK's autonomy. Britain has largely remained mum, failing to call out China on increasing violations of the Joint Declaration and the Basic Law.

Then things really accelerated with the premiership of Xi Jinping, and those tests have come thicker and faster.

While Britain doesn't necessarily have a large amount of leverage these days with its own problems going on, taking a principled stand on things in the public eye is not without its benefits.

Taking a principled stand only goes so far. If they’re challenged on that stand and don’t end up following through, it would make perfectly clear that Britain has 0 leverage, which I guess is scary for the British Government. Even if that is the truth.

Offering residency to every Cantonese HKer is not exactly 0 leverage. The could unilaterally have offered any number of places over the years since 97 in response to the many Chinese actions. HK is no longer the star relative to the rest of the Chinese economy so the influence of that is now far less than it might have been in the early 00s.

Britain once had influence within the EU and chose to throw that away. They could have used that influence to try and get a stronger reaction from the EU to the many and repeated transgressions, of both the word and principle of the Sino British declaration.

It's really sad to see that the only one consistently speaking out against Chinese actions has been Chris Patten, the last Governor.

Yes, although practicality of identifying who that means might mean that we do something slightly short of that - we could grant broader rights of abode and to work in the UK to British National (Overseas) passport holders (which anyone resident in HK prior to 1997 was eligible for and very large numbers registered for) in the same way we did in the early 2000s for what are now called British Overseas Territories Citizens (citizens of the remaining UK colonies).

What would be the problem with granting permissive citizenship, or a path to citizenship to citizens of HK in the UK?

Is the fear one of demographic change? It seems somewhat perplexing to me why the UK would not want to accept these folks who are fluent in English, highly educated, familiar with British civic principles (which are similar to the HK Government) and would likely provide a nice boost to the UK economy as well.

It would probably have been a huge boost to the economy - HK was doing far better than UK plc at the time, and had been for years.

Personally (as a Brit old enough to remember the creation of BNO status in the mid 80s) I see it as something to be deeply ashamed of nationally. We should have let far more get residency than we did. The fears were a) petty racism (partly driven by the Daily Fail and Sun, partly within the Tory party - Tebbit and others) and b) unemployment. Which has always struck me as absurd - even at the time when I was more Tory sympathetic politically - given how popular and well integrated the Chinese community has always been in the UK. Tebbit has always been an Enoch Powell apologist so no surprise on his views.

The Thatcher Tory government was presiding over near 12% unemployment in the UK and in 84 it was round about the peak post-war rate. They'd been elected on a smallish majority in 79 with the major advertising campaign being "Labour isn't working" [1] criticising the 6% unemployed. A rate so low that we've basically never returned to that level in the decades since, other than a brief spell prior to 08 banking crisis, but I digress. At the time of the Hong Kong declaration they'd just been re-elected on a landslide off the back of the Falklands victory, so they could have let far more in if the political will within the party were there. The Tories clearly had no problem with high unemployment - it was their policies caused it.

Governments lately seem to believe or act as though it is nothing whatsoever to do with them.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labour_Isn't_Working

That's all very true - the context in the early 1980s was that the UK government had only changed UK citizenship law to fully exclude the remaining colonies from citizenship in 1981 (which became effective in 1983); Enoch Powell was still an MP (albeit for the UUP not the Conservatives) and Commonwealth/colonial immigration in general was still seen by a large number of people as a problem, often for racist reasons.

But I don't think that's the whole story. Once the UK had conceded that it would hand over Hong Kong, it was determined to use it in a positive way - hoping that China would see the success of Hong Kong and try to emulate it, by liberalising its economy, rather than moving Hong Kong towards the Chinese system. Deng Xiaoping was relatively newly in power and economic liberalisation in China was no longer unthinkable. In the context of the cold war, encouraging this was an important strategic imperative which it's easy to forget now.

There were very real (and arguably very justified) fears that granting UK citizenship automatically would have led to a huge brain drain effect which could have harmed Hong Kong and frustrated this objective.

Of course, by the 1990s the Cold War was over and none of this was relevant any more. The decision to only offer 50,000 people full UK citizenship then was indeed a huge mistake and something we should be ashamed of - unfortunately it didn't get wide publicity in the UK at the time the decision was made and I think people are still very unaware of it.

All true.

There seemed to be a distinct hierarchy to racism back then. That so many were in the NHS, running takeaways or corner shops undoubtedly helped soften the popular view for some nationalities.

You're right there was a hope, even expectation that China would eventually move somewhat into step with Hong Kong, as at the time it was so far ahead economically. I've always wondered how much of that was the public line rather than actual assessment within the Foreign Office or government. It seemed a little wishful when Communism still looked secure - before the wall fell, Eastern bloc nations were dropping like flies, and there were pro-democracy demos across China - which of course culminated in Tiananmen.

You're also right it mainly disappeared from view after the 97 handover ceremony, which is to be regretted.

> While Britain doesn't necessarily have a large amount of leverage

Sure it does. It could probably get a small coalition of American and possible European forces to facilitate an evacuation of the city for anyone who wants to leave, to Hong Kong, the U.K. or the United States. There is a lot of human capital in Hong Kong, capital that relies on competent government, fair courts and a government with a legitimate mandate.

This isn’t happening because domestic populations in the West aren’t wholly tuned into Hong Kong’s situation.

> a small coalition of American and possible European forces to facilitate an evacuation

I've seen documents circulated by the US military where they basically said 'we aren't sure we'd win against 2018 China'.

That sort of activity is a pretty clear attack on China's sovereignty, and I suspect the CCP would agree regardless of other possible interpretations.

The UK could break diplomatic ties and stop trading with China, but they can't do anything involving 'forces'. It is a tragic step for Hong Kong, but end of the day it is Chinese territory and they will get their way on anything they insist on.

> I've seen documents circulated by the US military where they basically said 'we aren't sure we'd win against 2018 China'

This isn’t helpful without a source. China’s army is formidable. Its Navy, however, is relatively weak.

In any case, this would (intentionally) never become a military conflict. The stakes are too low for both sides. If it came to a fight, the most would be sanctions against CPC leadership under the Magnitsky Act.

> This isn’t helpful without a source.

US Military, either Army or Navy. I don't remember exactly what was written on the cover. The context may have been an invasion of the mainland.

Anyway, if they want to wait a couple of years and do all this again that will probably be an academic detail. They are almost certainly improving their navy so they can be more pushy in the South China Sea.

> The stakes are too low for both sides.

A foreign power swooping in and offering support to dissidents? When one of China's biggest strategic goals is enforcing unity among 1.4 billion people? China could very easily see the situation differently.

It would be similar to Russia organising a uniformed 'humanitarian convoy' with China and Iran, then trundled over to America to offer material support to separatist Texans or Californians. If there was a belief it might actually make a difference that action would provoke quite a response.

Although I doubt the UK or US are about to go to war with China, both have and do engage in 'sabre rattling' involving actual forces - eg deliberately sending aircraft carriers through disputed areas of the South China Sea.

The UK has its own political turmoil it's dealing with. That said, it would be comical to see Boris Johnson trying to sell a no-deal Brexit AND a plan to bring in thousands of political refugees to Parliament.

> UK has its own political turmoil it's dealing with

To be clear, I don’t think anyone will intervene. But to say nobody has any leverage is wrong. There is leverage, it simply isn’t being deployed because Hong Kong isn’t a priority.

The US and UK both have extradition treaties with HK (partly why Snowden fled to Russia), so they wouldn't have any standing if they tried to insist that China shouldn't have one.

China has none is part of the arrangement since long time ago. Not many place with proper rule of law has extradition arrangement with china. Only case by case.

I definitely understand why HK SAR would have issues with an extradition treaty, I was just giving a reason in my above comment as to why the US or UK wouldn't intervene in this scenario.

I’m not sure why you’re downvoted. There’s immense financial and human capital in HK (due to low taxes and access to APAC), both relatively mobile. Europe absorbed millions of poor and unskilled Syrians. Half a million knowledge and highly skilled service workers from HK would be possible, even desirable for many countries.

This issue has been resolved over 30 years ago. The answer is no.

I was born in British Hong Kong. I had a British passport, one that is in a special category (BNO) that was issued to non-citizen. It does not allow residency in UK, or even guarantees the passport holder can enter UK at all. The issue of former colony subject coming to UK has been debated and settled. The answer is no.

They have bigger problems now, like Brexit.

It seems that the government is not giving up.

The politics in HK pseudo-democracy seems complex. Is there any way to democratically remove pro-Beijing camp from the power? Unless there is, it seems like the government just has to weather the storm.

It's exceedingly unlikely to happen (and Beijing would likely find a way to prevent it from happening) in the legislature ("Legco"). This is due to combination of proportional representation in the geographic constituencies, and the fact that half the seats are taken up by functional constituencies which are mostly pro-Beijing. And the Chief Executive is explicitly chosen from a pool of pro-Beijing candidates, so that wouldn't happen unless the law is changed. (The law that enacted this in 2014 was one of the sparks for the so-called "Umbrella Revolution")

Some relevant wiki articles:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_NPCSC_Decision_on_Hong_Ko...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legislative_Council_of_Hong_Ko...

Yes, but you need a very tilted election toward them due to the indirect nature of the election. Probably about 65% of vote against Beijing parties would do it.

I hope these people stay strong when the heavy handed crackdown occurs. This time there are millions of cameras watching.

That's of very little comfort in today's world.

For example: People in EU can see footage of drowning people trying to cross the mediteranean sea, and react by punishing the orgnizations who try to help.

Really, the interpretation of events matters much much more, than some footage.

I think he is referring to the millions of Chinese government cameras with facial recognition.

China is going to use these protests as an excuse to accelerate taking control of Hong Kong.

If Democracy were to die in HK, I think it’s better for it to die this way rather than a silent squeal like what has happened here in America. The executive runs roughshod ignoring laws and subpoenas, the idiot President openly invites foreign assistance to win elections and not a single protest among over 300 million so called Patriotic Americans.

100% agree. It shocks me a little bit how few protests there are in the US right now.

It died with Citizens United, and everything since then from Democrats and Republicans is just parts of the game of keeping the masses content while selling out to the oligarchs. If you didn't notice til Trump, you weren't paying attention.

But it's still nothing compared to the Hong Kong situation, so there is that I guess.

We trade with China so readily without even a thought of the kind of dark totalitarian regime reigns, anything for profit right ?

Feel very sorry for the HK citizens but there is nothing the UK can do, HK being returned to China was seen as part of the end of UK influence which (people wanted?), meaning we have 0 influence now.

However being under the sphere of China's political surveillance system is clearly not what anybody wanted.

I noted with interest how citizens binned all digital methods of payment and comms to avoid be prosecuted for being at the demonstrations retrospectively and presumably extradited to some prison factory in China if the extradition dictat gets through.

Anyway IMHO Trump has inadvertently tried to reset the balance and caused the Chinese alot of problems by starving them of tech know how and trade. But as we know Presidents come and go - Communist China is eternal - they will just wait for the next leader to turn around and sell out everyone.

A key difference to understand between protests in America and in Hong Kong is that there is no division in Hong Kong about the issue. In the US, for example, half of the population opposes Trump and half supports him. There are anti-Trump protests and pro-Trump rally. The US is divided on many issues.

In Hong Kong, the whole population is united against the government. The territory is democratic on paper, but no longer in practice and basically run by the CCP.

(Note, recently moved from the US to HK and went to see the protests for myself yesterday, though I didn't actively participate)

I’d like to believe that but just yesterday someone posted links to a Chinese news site showing lots of visible support for the pro government side. Lots of signs in the city showing support and a fleet of fishing boats with signs. Even if this is pure propaganda it shows there is visible support (even if artificial).

Upwards of 1 million people were at the protest this past Sunday. There's only a population of 7 million people in the entire SAR. That's the proportional equivalent of every man, woman &child in California, Oregon and Washington meeting in a single spot to protest something. Even if not everyone agrees on the exact details of what they're protesting, seeing that much passionate support behind a cause is a good indicator that the outrage is widespread.

Fishing boats could've been requisitioned from anywhere. Signs put up by party cadres. I think those are perhaps examples of propaganda that everyone on the ground there knows is false but are put up for the sake of the international media. I don't get the impression that there is much support for the pro-government side among HKers at all, from the couple I know living abroad.

What little visible support there is is manufactured. The supporting signs in the city are on the buildings of Chinese state-owned companies.

Carrie Lam has 43% support according to public opinion polls [1]

[1]https://www.hkupop.hku.hk/english/popexpress/ce2017/cl/cecom...

I have read several times that China has been moving progressively more pro-Beijing Han Chinese into HK. Much like policy in other regions China has occupied like Tibet and Xinjiang. I have never seen numbers or percentage of population behind those headlines. I wonder what proportion of the population they now make up.

Yes, it is several hundred people per day entering permanently or semipermanently.

Should look at the comparison. Also there are others if one look at opposition as well.

Donald Trump has 44% (as of June 12) according to FiveThirtyEight:

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/trump-approval-ratings/

Sadly not, my wife who is from HK and strongly supports the protests just had a fight with her parents because they support the government. They even lived in mainland China during the cultural revolution, suffered for it, but still think the communist party can do no wrong.

This is false. I’m a Hong Kong citizen. I support the government. Most people that support the government just don’t bother to demonstrate.

Unfortunately, we know that people are literally paid to post pro China activism on the internet. You need independent verification to even be an anicdote.

"Unfortunately, we know that people are literally paid to post pro China activism on the internet."

It really goes both ways. You don't see pro-government support from western media because it doesn't fit their narrative. It's a two way filter. Stop thinking just because you have "free media", you'd have all facts. The fact that your parent commenter believe this is a 100% one sided matter shows how these brainwash propaganda can affect both sides.

Then good thing I didn't just notice this on "western media" and instead went and saw it for myself in Hong Kong. I've talked to HKers of all ages.

Sorry to have to break it to you, but it is unanimous. An overwhelming majority of the population is against the extradition bill, and any shows of pro-government support are manufactured as propaganda.

Lots of my young HK friends are having bitter fights with their parents because their parents don't support the protests. In any society, especially one like HK, there's always going to be a lot of pro-institutionalist people. They might not think that Carrie Lam is the best administrator possible but they think it's better not to rock the boat.

If you're out on the streets and talking to people, then of course all of them are anti-extradition since that's why they're out. Ask them instead if they know anyone who is against the protests. I'm sure they'll tell you about HS friends or uncles or bosses who are for this bill passing. The last public polling had 11% in support of the bill which, while definitely not a majority, is also not insubstantial and is too large to be dismissed as a viewpoint generated entirely through manufactured propaganda.

I see in this survey[1], 47.2% are against the extradition bill, 23.8% supports, and the remaining are neutral. I don't think 47.2% is An overwhelming majority.

[1] http://video3.mingpao.com/inews/201906/20190607_Mingpaopoll....

Hacker News is also allowed through the Chinese firewall for some reason.

Also, Chinese people travel to Hong Kong pretty freely, where there is no Great Firewall at all.

Sure. What I was trying to say is that it is very easy for people in mainland China to use this site since it is not firewalled, so expect a lot of Chinese residents to comment here.

It was more or less the only site I could regularly use when I was there two weeks for work recently.

And they are usually not paid that much.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/50_Cent_Party

Just curious, could you tell me what kind of verification do I need to provide?

Please back up your preposterous claims with data.

Police brutality is pure shit and has to be internally investigated and transparently resolved.

However, I dislike the current biased image and video reporting on Hong Kong protests. I understand that this plays perfectly into the current anti-China narrative, but we should be aware that such things are never one-sided and simple.

There is a lot of shit going on from both sides: police and violent protesters. To make a balance to the highly inacceptable police behaviour, please also find footage speaking against violent protesters:

Protestors "arming up": https://i.redd.it/faobvwh4qx331.jpg

Protestors beating up a police man: https://www.reddit.com/r/HongKong/comments/bzza2h/peaceful_p...

The moment when it escalated (the protestors goal was to storm the building, police was behaving in a de-escalative way by withdrawing, while being attacked by objects thrown into the police lines): https://www.twitch.tv/videos/437882587?t=03h05m00s

Coverage of protestors behaving aggressively: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQfOfIAexzw&feature=youtu.be

Again, all this does NOT excuse any tit for toe police brutality attack. But I am a believer of fair and balanced reporting and I want to see both sides.

These people are ultimately protesting because they're under the thumb of a totalitarian regime.

This is like saying that a fair and balanced account of WWII must include a discussion of the Jews being unruly train passengers.

Please don't go full Godwin. It never helps.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

"This is like saying a fair and balanced account of the Kent State Shootings must include a discussion of students throwing teargas at the national guard[1]" would perhaps be a more accurate historical comparison.

But I think a reductio ad absurdum to Godwin in this case makes the point more eloquently. I.e. that the GP is making an appeal to a balanced treatment of violence of "both sides" where one side is literally a totalitarian government that the people in question have no non-violent recourse to replace.

1. https://omeka.library.kent.edu/special-collections/items/sho...

In the interest of being fair and balanced, I often account for the imbalance of power, or else we wouldn't be seeing any conflict at all. Often the threat of violence is enough to coerce, and that doesn't get coverage. So when there is violent protests, I'm going to give more lenience to the group with far less power and force.

The sentiment is commendable. However, the way you've framed the "both sides" argument is a bit misleading.

Hardly any bricks were thrown. It is also a daft comparison, as the police were armed up for days with extremely powerful weapons. The asymmetry in terms of preparedness and armaments is off the charts.

"The moment when it escalated" is also not quite right as it is missing the context where, on Sunday night / Monday morning, the police attacked protesters with an extreme degree of violence.

Underneath any society there is violence. If you don't pay your taxes, eventually they will forcefully put you to jail.

Now, the default is not violence. These protests started peacefully. But when they are ignored, violence becomes necessary. We are all animals after all, and as such we don't go down without a fight.

Yes, I felt something in tune with that. I sympathize with people protesting the China machine taking over. But storming a parliament rarely ends well, and I respect substantial efforts to prevent that, especially in a somewhat functioning democracy such as Hong Kong still is.

...the parliament is literally ignoring millions of people on the streets.

At some point you make violent protest and revolution inevitable. Peace for the sake of peace is useless and an extremely centrist view.

There is a threshold, I know too little about the situation to say whether my personal one would be reached if I lived there.

No taxation without representation.

Police 'violence'? Have they never been to America? Or seen any G8 meeting in Canada or Europe? Talk about propaganda...

Yes, Americans are #1 in the world for police violence. And congratulations to us!

edit: I earlier said that this was the first time HK used teargas/rubber bullets, which is inaccurate. the important thing is that this is still violence, just because the US beats everyone in terms of sheer scale/frequency/intensity of police violence doesn't mean that this isn't police violence.

Tear gas was definitely used in '14, see this image from the Umbrella Movement protests:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Hong_Kong_protests#/media...

Multiple sources also mention rubber bullets being used in '14 as well:

https://www.google.com/search?q=umbrella+revolution+rubber+b...

ah, you're right, I misread the SCMP coverage yesterday, guess when they said "tear gas was used for the first time" that it was the first time ever, and not just within the protests this time.

the NYT article also has:

"The use of rubber bullets represented a turning point in the police response and was the first time the government acknowledged using the nonlethal rounds in Hong Kong in decades. The police response following the protesters’ push toward the Legislative Council was noticeably more aggressive as peaceful protests became more pitched throughout the day."

So maybe the use of force hasn't changed vs 2014, but the government's brazenness has.

Not then. Leung dare not. Do not know why lan dare.

The UK proved that rubber bullets can kill people[0]. The French first deployed tear gas during WWI.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rubber_bullet#Riot_control_use

Hundreds of thousands protesting, hundreds who attack police and try to storm a government building... Seems like a pretty measured response. Try that in any other country.

Are you suggesting that no other country can possibly have police violence, because the US does?

If so, that's preposterous. Both can be heavy-handed!

If not, what is the point of your comment?

Whenever china appears on hackernews...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism

And inconsistently moderated. Actual HN staff seem to hover between not caring about the obvious tactics at play - even calling it a "trope" a if we were in a movie, or flagging posts calling out the tactic while the originals stay preserved (as do the ensuing derailed conversations)

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20169100

I tried emailing this same staffer to get my account deleted to escape this encroaching noise. They really don't give a shit. I'll be surprised if your post is still here later.

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