Aerial footage filmed by a drone shows the large number of people joining pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong. Protest leaders have threatened to step up their campaign if the region’s chief executive does not meet them by midnight on Tuesday, after he insisted that Beijing would not retreat on limits to voting reforms Guardian
We’re going to button up this live blog but will be launching a new blog from Australia shortly – please visit our home page for updates. Here’s a summary of where things stand:
As dawn broke in Hong Kong Wednesday, thousands of protesters who had spent the night in the streets despite heavy rains prepared to mark National Day, a major holiday across China, with new demonstrations.
The protesters’ continued presence in the streets was a rebuke to Hong Kong chief executive CY Leung, who had called on them to leave.
Beijing said it supported the local government. “We fully believe in and support the Hong Kong SAR government to deal with this issue,” a foreign ministry spokesperson said.
Protesters vowed to stay in the streets, although some leaders expressed concerns about a potential backlash to a prolonged sit-in.
Protesters chant “Jiayou! Jiayou!” or “Keep it up!” while waving their cellphones with the LED flashlights sparkling in the dark as they gather on the streets near the government headquarters, Wednesday, Oct. 1, 2014 in Hong Kong. Photograph: Wong Maye-E/AP
Student protesters rest as thousands occupy a main thoroughfare in Hong Kong, late Tuesday, Sept. 30, 2014. Photograph: Wally Santana/AP
Protesters create space for an ambulance to pass during protests outside the Hong Kong Government Complex on September 30, 2014 in Hong Kong, Hong Kong. Photograph: Chris McGrath/Getty Images
Who is guiding the Umbrella Movement? More than one leader and more than one group. The Guardian’s Jonathan Kaiman (@jrkaiman) in Beijing has written a guide to the movement leadership. The piece begins:
Hong Kong’s Umbrella Revolution has no singular leader – the protesters come from a huge swath of Hong Kong society, and have a range of demands – but it does have a handful of de facto spiritual guides. They can be divided into two camps. Leaders of the influential protest movement Occupy Central with Love and Peace – Benny Tai, Chan Kin-Man and Chu Yiu-Ming – are generally middle-aged, politically experienced, and self-restrained. This older group may have been eclipsed by student leaders Joshua Wong and Alex Chao. They tend to be more idealistic, headstrong, and social media-savvy than their elder counterparts.
Writing in Comment is Free, Martin Jacques, author of “When China Rules the World,” argues that since the 1997 handover, China has, “whatever the gainsayers might suggest, overwhelmingly honoured its commitment to the principle of one country, two systems”:
The legal system remains based on English law, the rule of law prevails, and the right to demonstrate, as we have seen so vividly in recent days, is still very much intact. The Chinese meant what they offered. Indeed, it can reasonably be argued that they went to extremes in their desire to be unobtrusive: sotto voce might be an apt way of describing China’s approach to Hong Kong. At the time of the handover, and in the three years I lived in Hong Kong from 1998, it was difficult to identify any visible signs of Chinese rule: I recall seeing just one Chinese flag.
Jacques’ piece includes many observations of how life in the territory has changed since the handover, including in who vacations there:
Two decades ago westerners comprised the bulk of Hong Kong’s tourists, today mainlanders account for the overwhelming majority, many of them rather more wealthy than most Hong Kong Chinese. Likewise, an increasing number of mainlanders have moved to the territory – which is a growing source of resentment. If China needed Hong Kong in an earlier period, this is no longer nearly as true as it was. On the contrary, without China, Hong Kong would be in deep trouble.
One of Hong Kong’s leading pro-democracy campaigners has accused David Cameron of selling out activists in the territory “for 30 pieces of silver,” the Guardian’s Luke Harding (@lukeharding1968) and Richard Norton-Taylor (@nortontaylor) report:
On Tuesday Cameron said he was “deeply concerned” about the situation in Hong Kong, but the prime minister has failed to back the demands of the pro-democracy campaigners, who argue that China’s tight restrictions on candidates for the post of chief executive ahead of 2017 elections violate the joint agreement signed by Britain and Hong Kong in 1997.
... in an interview with the Guardian, the veteran pro-democracy campaigner Martin Lee called on Cameron to play of more high-profile diplomatic role.
Lee said: “Cameron should talk to the Chinese leadership. He should say: “What the hell is happening? You promised Hong Kong democracy. How can you reverse that?” Cameron needs to intervene and say democracy means genuine democracy. You can’t give the vote without giving the right to nominate candidates. He should do more.”
“Protests in Admiralty showed no signs of abating,” the Wall Street Journal reports in a newly published report. “But many of the people present expressed concern that the rallies were becoming too confrontational”:
Richie Yue, a student at the University of Hong Kong, said he was in the area near Bauhinia Square early Wednesday to ask protesters to leave, worrying that their presence veered too far from the goals of the Occupy Central activist movement, which advocates peaceful protests.
“This is different from the aim of occupying Central, which just aims at blocking the main roads. People here want to stop the ceremony tomorrow morning.”
The current protest in Hong Kong had forerunners in 2012 and 2003, notes Brookings Institution senior fellow Richard C Bush III in a post on the Up Front blog. “The lesson that Hong Kong’s middle class learned: protest works,” he writes:
With the proposed shift from selection by 1200 to election by all eligible voters, there was substantial hope for a system that would permit the possibility of competitive elections and of a popular check on concentrated economic power. That hope was dashed on August 31st, when Beijing decided to control who got nominated to run in a one-person, one-vote election. It is that decision that Hong Kong’s disadvantaged middle class is protesting.
Economic power and political power in Hong Kong are two sides of the same coin. They reinforce each other. And, to a significant extent, the same people dominate each arena. The public feels unrepresented in both board rooms and government chambers, but they have learned that there is one arena that they can dominate: The Street. For the immediate future, the question is whether middle class protest cause enough damage to business that the tycoons themselves decide that more democracy will actually enhance stability rather than undermine it.
Here’s another Guardian Witness submission from user amaryllisnight:
Demonstrators resting on a flyover near Admiralty
See earlier Guardian Witness submissions here – and if you’re at the protests, upload your pictures, video and text to Guardian Witness here. Thanks for participating.
We’ve just added video to the top of the blog of dramatic drone footage of the protests.
Here’s the video that formerly occupied the top slot, of Hong Kong chief executive Leung Chun-ying telling protesters that the election rules for 2017 will not be altered:
Hong Kong’s chief executive, Leung Chun-ying, warns pro-democracy protesters that China will not budge in its decision to restrict who can stand for the city’s top post in the 2017 election. Leung’s rejection of the demonstrators’ demands dashes hopes for a quick resolution of the standoff that has blocked many streets, bringing parts of the city to a standstill Guardian
Pro-democracy protestors use umbrellas to shield themselves from heavy rain in Hong Kong on September 30, 2014. Photograph: ANTHONY WALLACE/AFP/Getty Images
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