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Hong Kong protests
Hong KongPolitics

Tear gas fired, arrests made as thousands protest against Beijing’s planned national security law for Hong Kong

  • Police say at least 180 people arrested in crackdown as protesters spread out along streets of Causeway Bay and Wan Chai
  • Top Chinese officials seek to ease fears about new law’s impact on local freedoms but remain stern about seeing it implemented

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Riot police fire tear gas at the junction of Hennessy Road and Percival Street. Photo: Sam Tsang
Phila SiuandChris Lau
Police fired multiple rounds of tear gas in Hong Kong’s Causeway Bay shopping district on Sunday as thousands took to the streets to protest against Beijing’s planned national security law for the city, even as top Chinese officials sought to ease fears about its impact on local freedoms but remained stern about seeing it implemented.

Police said at least 180 people were arrested – mostly on suspicion of unauthorised assembly, unlawful assembly and disorderly conduct in a public place – in a crackdown as protesters spread out along streets of Causeway Bay and Wan Chai.

A water cannon truck was used and volleys of tear gas were fired in a series of confrontations as some radicals among the protesters defying the government’s coronavirus crowd restrictions blocked multiple roads, smashed traffic lights, lit small fires and hurled bricks dug up from pavements at police.

Some also vandalised shops, while at least two people objecting to the roadblocks were severely assaulted by black-clad groups.

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Tear gas fired as thousands protest Beijing’s planned national security law for Hong Kong

Tear gas fired as thousands protest Beijing’s planned national security law for Hong Kong

Ten people were admitted to hospital, including a 51-year-old woman in critical condition, the Hospital Authority said. The other nine were either in a stable condition or later discharged from hospital. The woman, reportedly a cleaner with underlying heart problems, had suffered a panic attack and collapsed as a group of people rushed into a toilet where she was.

The protests erupted just hours after Chinese Vice-Premier Han Zheng, Beijing’s top leader in charge of Hong Kong, told local delegates to the national legislature that Beijing’s determination to push through the national security law should not be underestimated, and that mainland authorities would “implement it till the end”.

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