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Chloe Lai

Two dozen  protesters were camped inside the cordoned-off former Star Ferry terminal in Central last night demanding a halt to further demolition after a clock face was taken down from the building's tower.

One person was injured when about 20 protesters broke the police barricade and rushed into the building at about 6pm yesterday to join five who had pushed their way in two hours earlier.

A further 20 were outside, continuing a  sit-in  that has been going on since November 13. The protesters said they would not leave  until the government met their demands, which include Secretary for Housing, Planning and Lands  Michael Suen Ming-yeung  discussing the pier's future  with the Legislative Council and professionals.

The injured person, newspaper photographer Leung Wai-wan,   said he was hit by a security guard. He was sent to Queen Mary Hospital.

The clock face was removed at 3.09 pm after members of the Antiquities Advisory Board  decided at a closed-door meeting to endorse the demolition.

But chairman Edward Ho Sing-tin  said the board 'strongly demands' that the government reconstruct the clock tower and Queen's Pier on the new Central waterfront.

'We understand preserving the pier at the same location is difficult and we also think it doesn't have much meaning to preserve it as it is,'  he said. 'The government has planned and designed the infrastructure, tendered the contract and construction has already started. It is difficult to make any changes  so we decided it is unnecessary to conduct another review of the pier's historic value.'

The Civil Engineering and Development Department  said the clock face would be given to the Star Ferry Company in the meantime.

The History Museum  said it had not been given permission to house the clock so  it would not be  there in the near future.

The board also discussed a 2001 government environmental impact assessment  on the Central reclamation that describes the old Star Ferry pier as a structure of 'great significance' and warns that its destruction would provoke a public outcry.

Allegations surfaced on Monday that there had been  no in-depth discussion of the fate of the pier, and no vote on the matter, when the antiquities board met on March 12, 2002.



Star Ferry standoff as protesters break in to stop pier's demolition