For 15 weeks the people of Hong Kong have been rising up against the erosion of their civil and political rights. On 15 September the city centre turned into a guerrilla zone. An account of the cries of rage and the possible future scenarios of the protests.
The air is heavy. The humidity is suffocating. The sky looming over the imposing skyscrapers of Hong Kong Island has turned grey all of a sudden, pressing you down to the ground. Sheltering beneath a barrier of umbrellas held together like a Roman infantry formation, a group of young people dressed in black are crouching just centimetres above the rough asphalt, soaked with the blue liquid just sprayed by the Chinese riot police's water cannons.
From behind the gas mask covering almost her entire face, twenty-two-year-old Hoi shouts to her companions to move quickly. A few metres away, tear gas canisters have come raining down. The formation opens up, one young man kicks a canister away, and the group retreats behind a concrete road divider as the toxic air spreads and clouds everything, amid screams and explosions. "We have to show the government that we won't stop. We don't want the Chinese tyrants to destroy the soul of our city. Maybe some people have turned the page and given up, but we haven't," Hoi exclaims, watching a group of volunteer paramedics come to the aid of one of her companions.
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Her near-contemporary Tung echoes her sentiments, shouting: "Those police dogs arrest and mistreat people who are protesting peacefully. They stop us from expressing ourselves. They have to be stopped!" From behind the modern "trench" just below an overpass, protesters hurl bricks, improvised Molotov cocktails, and attempt to storm the Chinese army headquarters next to the institutional buildings of the Central government complex.
The imbalance between the forces at play is, however, too obvious. After a few hours, the Hong Kong people's army — made up of a few thousand pro-democracy protesters — is in retreat, pursued by the riot police of the pro-Beijing government. A few more skirmishes in various parts of the city, in keeping with the motto "Be water" that the movement has taken from cinema idol Bruce Lee. More improvised barricades and assaults on the Admiralty and Wan Chai metro stations. The struggle turns into a manhunt, with young protesters rushing to hide, discarding their equipment and trying to blend in with passers-by, while the police embark on a sweep of violent and indiscriminate checks. Then it all ends and Hong Kong, a wealthy Asian economic hub of more than 7 million inhabitants, goes back to its pulse.
Yet the protest of Sunday 15 September had begun as a very peaceful march, in keeping with the other dissent initiatives organised in the former British colony over the past fifteen weeks, such as flash mobs at symbolic locations and artistic and commemorative installations. Despite the city government led by Carrie Lam having banned all demonstrations for Sunday, in the early afternoon a human river of Hong Kongers — including elderly people, women and children — poured into the streets, marching peacefully along the wide Hennessy Road, armed with face masks and placards, singing "Glory to Hong Kong", the protest anthem, at the tops of their voices, along with slogans such as "Stand with Hong Kong" and "Five demands, not one less", in reference to the five demands put forward by the movement.
On this point, ten days ago Lam's executive made some concessions, including the withdrawal of the extradition bill that would have allowed certain criminal cases to be transferred to China for trial and had triggered the new wave of protests. But that is no longer enough: the pro-democracy movement is also demanding an independent inquiry into the conduct of the police during the protests, the release of arrested dissidents, and a general review of the institutional framework and of relations with China.
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Hong Kong is protesting because, since the former British colony was "returned" to China in 1997, citizens have been concerned about the gradual erosion of their civil and political rights. The metropolis, though culturally closely tied to mainland China, developed differently thanks to a liberal economic and political system and common law, forging its own identity.
