Chinese editorial calls for “tougher line to restore order” in Hong Kong

Author: Leonardo Pinho
China Daily, a daily newspaper controlled by the Chinese Communist Party, published an editorial article that begins listing the supposed offenses committed by the “radical protesters” and then explaining that their only motivation is to “vent the anger” and break the law.
The article proceeds to give a detailed example of an act of vandalism on a mainland’s news agency, Xinhua, and connects that event to supposed attacks on other news outlets and journalists. According to the editorial, there is a strategy behind these attacks: “convince the world” of protesters’ good intentions and peaceful behavior, while being supported by western media.

These protesters are described as “naïve” and exploitable adolescents with “hormones pumped up”, that hide behind masks and umbrellas to hide from “criminal acts”. Journalists, on the other hand, are described as truth-telling professionals that “refuse to glorify anarchism”, targets of the protesters’ rage.
This article ends with a statement, that the autonomy residents had their lives “disrupted” and will be satisfied to see everything go back to “normal” once the “enforcement mechanism” and “legal system” are strengthened.
China Daily’s allegations of one-sided violence caused by the protesters don’t seem to match the Hong Kong Journalists Association statement, released at the end of October. According to this source, the Hong Kong Police Force has been actively “obstructing the work of the reporters” when covering the mass rallies, even after the association manifested “discontent” with the use of “excessive and unnecessary force”.
The statement invokes events that police officers are allegedly responsible for like spraying, throwing teargas cannisters, shouting, and even pointing a gun at reporters. These measures, according to the Hong Kong Journalists Association, are proof that the autonomy’s police ignore “freedom of reporting and freedom of press”, asking for the government to take action.
The tension between Hong Kong citizens and mainland China isn’t new, in fact, it has been growing ever since 1997, when the autonomy ceased to be controlled by the British. Under the Chinese rule, the adopted principle was “One country, two systems”, so Hong Kong could have its own government and its economic, political and legal affairs.
China’s perceived grip on the autonomy, its leadership and systems, made residents feel unpleased with the mainland’s actions especially since the early 2010s when, according to the residents, that grip got tighter.
This year an event reignited the brewing conflict. The Fugitive Offenders amendment bill was proposed by the Hong Kong government and its goal was to detain and extradite wanted criminals from territories like China or Taiwan, which have no formal agreement on those matters.
Citizens considered this a way of undermining the region’s autonomy, especially because the mainland’s regime could arrest political adversaries, circumventing Hong Kong’s laws and systems.
A wave of criticism swept the autonomy, the indignation was vocalized by journalists, organizations and by the residents themselves, sparkling mass protests that went beyond the borders of Hong Kong.
One of the various examples happened during a Boston Celtics game, one of the top NBA free picks betting odds and most titled team in the competition, with protesters hanging signs and wearing masks and helmets in support of the rallies. Protests lead to the bill’s suspension and later withdraw, but not to Carrie Lam’s fall.
The use of coercive violence against the protesters and the escalating tension between them and the police has been also one of the biggest concerns of the international community, with numerous accounts of confrontations between both parts. One of the events that caught the world’s attention happened in Tsuen Wan when a teenage protester was shot in the chest from close range by a police officer.
Most recently, a pro-democracy politician, Andrew Chiu, was attacked by a man who bit his ear and stabbed several people at Sunday’s rallies.