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Hong Kong police clear last protest site

December 15, 2014

The third and final protest area has been cleared by Hong Kong's police. The last week has seen authorities lauch a final campaign to end ten weeks of pro-democracy demonstrations.

https://p.dw.com/p/1E47S
Hongkong China Protest Barrikaden
Image: Reuters/Tyrone Siu

Hong Kong police cleared the last of the three main protest sites on Monday morning, bringing an end to two and a half months of civil disobedience in response to mainland China's efforts to control what they had promised would be democratic elections.

About 100 officers swept into Causeway Bay, a popular shopping district for tourists, to remove protestors from the smallest of the protest strongholds, having cleared the Mong Kok area in November and the Admiralty district last Thursday.

Protestors chanted "We will be back" and called on Hong Kong's chief executive, Leung Chun-ying, to step down. Several protestors, including a 90-year-old man in a wheelchair, showed their defiance by resisting the police call to "leave immediately" and staying put, willing to risk arrest.

Police have arrested more than 200 people in the past week as they attempt to end the demonstrations against Beijing's decision to screen all candidates in Hong Kong's first-ever direct elections for chief executive in 2017.

Not a failure

Despite the fact that China has thus far refused to make concessions, protestors are determined to carry on the movement, and they do not see Beijing's lack of response as a loss.

"I don't think it's a failure. This is not the end…I hope the next time we gather in the streets, we will be celebrating, instead of shedding tears for achieving nothing," said legal executive K.T. Tang to news agency Reuters as authorities dragged away tents and belongings and threw them in trucks.

Fernando Cheung, a pro-democracy lawmaker, told the Associated Press that new methods of civil disobedience were going forward, saying "in the legislative council will we do our best to resist through an uncooperative campaign," for example by voting down the government's electoral reform package.

Activists and politicians suspect that with the demonstrations coming to an end, China will most likely embark on a cover campaign inside Hong Kong's judiciary, media, and universities to ensure that protests do not continue.

es/mg (AP, dpa, Reuters)