Police vigil keep Hong Kong protesters away from airport

Hong Kong police prevented anti-government protesters from blocking access to the airport on Saturday, but fired tear gas for a second night running in the Chinese-ruled city’s densely populated district of Mong Kok in the 14th week of unrest.

Police checked for tickets and passports to allow only airline passengers through to the airport to avoid the chaos of last weekend, when activists blocked approach roads, threw debris on to train tracks and trashed the MTR subway station in the nearby new town of Tung Chung.

Protesters also occupied the arrivals hall last month, halting and delaying flights, amid a series of clashes with police.

As night fell on Saturday, there were some cat-and-mouse standoffs between protesters and police in Tung Chung, but no sign of renewed violence.

More than three months of protests have at times paralysed parts of Hong Kong, a major Asian financial hub, amid running street battles between protesters and police who have responded with tear gas, pepper spray and water cannon. Violent arrests of protesters have drawn international attention.

On Friday night hundreds of demonstrators, many masked and dressed in black, attacked MTR metro stations in the Mong Kok district, targeted because of televised scenes of police beating protesters on a metro train on Aug.31 as they cowered on the floor.

Activists, angry that the MTR closed stations to stop protesters from gathering and demanding CCTV footage of the beatings, tore down signs, broke turnstiles, set fires on the street and drew graffiti on walls.

Protesters gathered again after nightfall on Saturday to be dispersed by tear gas followed by running clashes with police. It was quickly over.

“We didn’t have the numbers,” said one masked male protester who fled from Prince Edward station pursued by riot police.

“We’ll be back.”

There were shouting matches in the afternoon outside the airport between police and people who wanted to pick up arriving family members but were told to go away.

“It’s absolutely ridiculous. We have our 80-year-old relative coming off the flight. How will she get home without our help?” said Donny, only giving his first name.

“These police don’t listen to anything we have to say. We are normal people.”

Chek Lap Kok airport was built in the dying days of British rule on reclaimed land around a tiny island and is reached by a series of bridges.

The protests have presented Chinese President Xi Jinping with his greatest popular challenge since he came to power in 2012.

Meanwhile,  German Chancellor Angela Merkel renewed calls for a peaceful solution to unrest in Hong Kong on Saturday during her trip to China.

“I have advocated that conflicts be resolved without violence and that anything else would be a catastrophe from my point of view,” Merkel said.

After talks with President Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang, Merkel said Beijing had listened to her views.

“This is important,” she added.

Joshua Wong, a leader of pro-democracy protests in 2014 that were the precursor to the current unrest, thanked Merkel for addressing the topic with Beijing but said her comments fell short.

“Germany’s business interest should not override the universal values in which we believe,” Wong said in an interview with Germany’s mass-circulation Bild am Sonntag newspaper.

“If the Chancellor wants to do something, she must help to urge President Xi to respond to the demand for free elections.”

Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam announced concessions this week aimed at ending the protests, including formally scrapping a hugely unpopular extradition bill, but many said the concessions were too little, too late. She said Beijing backed her “all the way”.

The bill would have allowed extraditions of people to mainland China to stand trial in courts controlled by the Communist Party. In contrast, Hong Kong has an independent judiciary dating back to British rule.

But the demonstrations, which began in June, have long since broadened into calls for more democracy and many protesters have pledged to fight on.

Agencies