Hong Kong student protesters threaten to target govt buildings

HONG KONG — One of the main student groups at the head of protests agitating for full democracy in Hong Kong has threatened to target government buildings in response to the police clearance of the Occupy camp in the crowded Mong Kok district and the government’s decision to station 6,000 officers to keep the area clear following violent clashes overnight.

“I think we have made it very clear that if (the police) continue the violent way of clearing up the place, we will take further actions,” Federation of Students member Ms Yvonne Leung Lai-kwok said on an RTHK radio programme. “The further actions include a possibility of some escalations pointed at government-related buildings or some government-related departments,” she said.

Ms Leung, president of the University of Hong Kong students’ union, said details were likely to be released today.

The students’ idea is in direct opposition to the plans of pan-democrats and Occupy founders, who at a joint meeting on Wednesday advocated ending the occupation.

The Occupy trio, Mr Benny Tai Yiu-ting, Dr Chan Kin-man and Mr Chu Yiu-ming, plan to turn themselves in to the police early next month.

The government, meanwhile, said there is no prospect of further talks if the students insist that the August decision of the National People’s Congress Standing Committee for Hong Kong’s political reform be revoked.

Meanwhile, about 6,000 police officers will be assigned to the cleared streets and nearby areas in Mong Kok until Sunday to prevent a reoccupation by protesters, a police source told the South China Morning Post newspaper. The source said the police would have 3,000 people on the ground at any time until Sunday, when a reassessment would be made.

“The police will continue to make their best effort to prevent people from obstructing the road again,” chief superintendent Steve Hui Chun-tak said in the report.

Clashes broke out between protesters and the police in Mong Kok in the early hours of yesterday, hours after traffic resumed on a key section of Nathan Road following two months of blockages by pro-democracy activists.

Among the dozens of people arrested by the police were Hong Kong student leader Joshua Wong, who was banned from a large area in Mong Kok as a condition of bail yesterday after he was arrested during scuffles with the police as they cleared one of the largest protest sites that have choked the city for weeks.

Mr Wong and activist lawmaker Leung Kwok-hung, who RTHK radio said was also banned from Mong Kok, were charged with obstructing court bailiffs and did not enter a plea. They are due to appear again in court on Jan 14.

Mr Wong, Mr Leung and Mr Lester Shum were among more than 100 people arrested in Mong Kok over the past two days. Mr Wong’s student group Scholarism confirmed the court ban.

The protesters are demanding open nominations for the city’s next chief executive nomination in 2017. Beijing said in August it would allow a vote, but only among pre-screened candidates. The Mong Kok clearance was the second time in as many weeks that police, court bailiffs and workers moved to enforce court-ordered injunctions to clear the streets.

The main protest site in Admiralty next to the city’s chief executive office and barracks for China’s People’s Liberation Army remains largely intact.

There is also a small protest site in the Causeway Bay shopping district. AGENCIES