In a Nutshell: the Hong Kong Revolution
By: Freedom Count
Tags: Freedom, Human Rights, Hong Kong, Movement, Revolution

1. Fighting against a Law that threatens Hong Kong’s freedoms

HK was a British colony before 1997 and exercises the British common law system. In HK, you are innocent until proven guilty, while in China, you are guilty until you prove your own innocence. China’s courts are not independent; they are directly under the Communist Party. Unfair trials and fabricated crimes are also frequently reported in China.

The government’s proposal to amend the law would allow China to declare/fabricate any crime on anyone that Communist Party dislikes, and instruct HK to extradite these people to China for trial.

2,000,000 people (2/7 of the population) protested in June to demand a withdrawal of the proposal, which government ignored for 3 months until 4th September, when a withdrawal was finally announced.

That’s at the expense of 1200 protesters arrested and tortured in “horror house” detention centres. Protesters were denied the right to seek legal advice. Tens of protestors were brutally beaten to serious conditions including broken ribs and concussions. 3 protesters were shot in the eye and one of them lost her right eye forever.

2. Extreme police violence: a humanitarian crisis

Since 12th June, numerous live footages have proven that police had:

- Brutally attacked protesters, journalists and first aiders

- Rubber bullets and bean-bag bullets were shot at the head instead of below the waist, causing permanent blindnesse

- Thousands of tear gases (including those expired) were fired into the subway

- Tear gases were deployed in residential areas, affecting non-protesters, babies and elderly homes

- Riot police with batons attacked every person on a subway train, protester or not.

- Arrested persons were seriously injured but hospitalization was delayed for 3 hours.

- Violent arresting actions have caused injuries in the cervical spine of a protesters, but police rejected help from medics and dragged his body

Amnesty International has confirmed that all these actions have breached international law.

The HK people demand an independent investigation committee led by a member of the judiciary, but this was outright rejected by government.

3. Police and gangsters team up

Apart from police brutality, government resorts to gangsters to terrorize the crowds. Hundreds of paid gangsters attacked passengers on the train and police deliberately walked away from the scene. Gangsters attacked protesters with knives on the streets but were never caught.

Pro-government activists held hammers and threatened to attack protestors, but only protestors end up being arrested. Almost all pro-government perpetrators were set free or bailed out, while most protesters were not allowed bail and legal proceedings were accelerated.

Basically, as long as you claim you love China, the government or the police, you can do whatever you want.

4. Media is controlled by Communist Party

After HK was handed back to China, Communist Party gradually controlled most media channels, including 90% of traditional newspapers, the biggest TV channel dominating 70% of the market share, and established several online media of their own.

These “red” media repeatedly created biased or even fake news, such as cutting away footages showing police brutality, and falsely claiming protestors committed certain crimes when other smaller online media were able to capture the exact opposite on their live feeds.

While most young people are able to see the truth online, the older generation are still highly reliant on traditional media which have become “red” without them realizing it.

5. We cannot elect our own leader

The Hong Kong Chief Executive is elected by a small group of 1600 people, whom are carefully selected by Beijing and will only vote for the candidate that Beijing likes. That’s why the CE doesn’t care what the people wants, and will only execute orders from Beijing.

Same with the legislature. Half the legislators are elected by “functional constituency”, the votes of which are also controlled in the hands of a few “representatives of each industry” who will only listen to Beijing orders.

HK has been fighting for universal suffrage ever since 1997. The failure by Beijing to establish a fair election system triggered the Umbrella Movement in 2014. Till now, universal suffrage is still the most important demand by the protestors and is the core of the 2019 Movement.