Hong Kong pro-democracy protesters return to the streets

Several thousand have marched in Hong Kong in the first large pro-democracy demonstration since protesters staged sit-ins in the city center last year. This time, organizers say no sites will be occupied.

Deutsche Welle, 1 Feb 2015

Demonstrators march for democracy in Hong Kong on February 1, 2015.
Philippe Lopez/AFP/Getty Images

Several thousand people took to the streets of Hong Kong on Sunday to call for "true universal suffrage" at leadership elections in 2017, with organizers saying there would be no repeat of last year's protest actions, in which key roads were shut down in the city center for two-and-a-half months.

Some 2,000 police were deployed to prevent a repeat of the sit-ins last year

Many of the protesters on Sunday carried yellow umbrellas, which became a symbol of last year's campaign after being used by demonstrators to protect themselves from pepper spray used by police to disperse the crowds.

Others were armed with protective shields, fearing violence from anti-democracy groups later in the evening.

"We want to make it clear to the government that ... we want true universal suffrage," one of the organizers, Daisy Chan, said.

No concession from Beijing

The protest comes as tensions in the former British colony remain high, with Chinese authorities consistently rejecting activists' demands for a free selection of candidates at the 2017 elections.

The Chinese government announced late in August that candidates for the elections would first be vetted by a pro-Beijing committee, sparking protests, known as the Occupy Central movement, that drew up to 100,000 people at their height and led to the establishment of several sit-in sites in various parts of the city.

Officials cleared the last of the protest camps in December.

Hong Kong was returned to China by Great Britain in 1997 under a so-called "one country, two systems" agreement that envisaged a high degree of autonomy for the global financial hub.

Pro-democracy activists accuse Beijing of gradually eroding the city's wide-ranging freedoms and of reneging on a promise to allow Hong Kongers to freely elect their chief executive.

tj/sb (Reuters, AFP)

Related Articles:

Showdown looms for Beijing and Hong Kong

Western values not allowed in university: China's education minister