HONG KONG — Hundreds of pro-democracy protesters are facing off with Hong Kong police as they step up their movement for genuine democratic reforms after being camped out on the streets for more than two months.

Student protest leaders tonight (Nov 30) told a big crowd rallying at the main protest site outside government headquarters that they would escalate their campaign by surrounding the building.

The crowd tried to push its way down a narrow staircase in an attempt to get to the office of the city’s Beijing-backed leader. Hundreds of protesters charged past police lines, blocking traffic on a main road, but were stopped by police barricades from going down an access road to Chief Executive Leung Chun-Ying’s office.

Police arrested at least five protesters, according to the Hong Kong Federation of Students, one of the groups that have played important roles in organising the protest movement, which is seeking free elections in the former British colony.

Many in the crowd were wearing surgical masks, hard hats, goggles and construction-style eye protectors. Some were carrying umbrellas, which have become symbols of the protest movement, and many were shouting “I want true democracy”.

At about 9pm, crowds filled Harcourt Road, Tin Mei Avenue and the footbridge linking the government complex to Admiralty MTR station, reported the South China Morning Post (SCMP).

Some 7,000 policemen will be deployed tonight — 4,000 in Mong Kok and 3,000 in Admiralty — to prepare for possible escalation of the Occupy protests, while hospitals have prepared to accept larger-than-usual numbers of casualties, SCMP reported.

Earlier today, police warned that they would take action to prevent the protesters from surrounding government headquarters. They said in a statement that they would “take resolute enforcement actions” and would “use minimum level of force to stop any violent and illegal acts, so as to uphold the law and order”.

Authorities last week used an aggressive operation to clear out the protest camp on the busy streets of Hong Kong’s crowded Mong Kok district, one of three protest zones around the semiautonomous city.

The protesters are demanding that the Hong Kong government scrap a plan by China’s Communist leaders to use a panel of Beijing-friendly elites to screen candidates for Hong Kong’s leader in inaugural 2017 elections. AP