{"id":178122,"date":"2014-10-14T19:23:59","date_gmt":"2014-10-15T02:23:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/?p=178122"},"modified":"2014-10-14T20:54:20","modified_gmt":"2014-10-15T03:54:20","slug":"hong-kong-police-forcibly-clear-protesters-barricades","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/2014\/10\/hong-kong-police-forcibly-clear-protesters-barricades\/","title":{"rendered":"Hong Kong Police Forcibly Clear Protesters’ Barricades"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hong Kong police have cleared a number of protest sites in the city, removing the increasingly elaborate barriers erected in response to earlier efforts. The makeshift fortifications included everything from cling film, wire and rubbish bins to iron chains and cement<\/a>, with a bamboo skeleton provided by sympathetic construction workers<\/strong><\/a>. From Keith Bradsher at The New York Times:<\/p>\n

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Eric Wu, a 37-year-old construction worker, has spent his entire adult life building and climbing bamboo scaffolding as high as 50 floors above the ground.<\/p>\n

But on Monday morning, he used his talents to pursue a different goal \u2014 lashing together two-inch-thick bamboo poles in an elaborate lattice that he designed to protect an encampment of pro-democracy student protesters here. The lattice was a yard high, about 20 feet wide and 30 feet deep, and blocked a road near the Hong Kong Police Headquarters.<\/p>\n

[\u2026] Mr. Wu\u2019s labors brought together one of China\u2019s oldest traditions \u2014 bamboo scaffolding \u2014 with Hong Kong\u2019s widespread aspirations for democracy, particularly among the young, and a dissatisfaction with the local economy among blue-collar workers.<\/p>\n

[\u2026] Mr. Wu began creating his bamboo barrier after the police, in a series of raids on protest encampments Monday, carted off many of the barriers of steel or super-hardened plastic that the students had been using. Most of these barriers actually belonged to the police, but the students had commandeered them when the police largely withdrew from the city center on Sept. 29. [Source<\/a><\/strong>]<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Once the original barriers had been cleared, counter-protesters swept in<\/strong><\/a>. It remains unclear whether their actions were coordinated with those of the police, as many protest supporters have alleged. From The Washington Post’s Simon Denyer:<\/p>\n

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Tensions peaked about midday Monday as hundreds of people converged on the site demanding that the roads be reopened.<\/p>\n

As the opponents chanted slogans against the sit-in, groups of men, many wearing surgical masks, rushed the barricades at both ends of Queensway, a wide street that runs through Admiralty district.<\/p>\n

[\u2026] \u201cOpen the roads,\u201d chanted dozens of people unhappy with the sit-in, accusing the students of being tools of the West and not \u201creal Chinese.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cDon\u2019t let them pass,\u201d the pro-democracy demonstrators replied, accusing their opponents of not being Hong Kong natives. \u201cGo back to the mainland,\u201d they chanted. \u201cSpeak Cantonese.\u201d [Source<\/a><\/strong>]<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The subsequently rebuilt barriers were short-lived<\/strong><\/a>, as the AFP’s Jerome Taylor and Dennis Chong reported:<\/p>\n

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Around 150 police dismantled metal barricades at the Causeway Bay site before dawn Tuesday, an AFP journalist at the scene saw, freeing up traffic in one direction but leaving the protest camp there largely intact.<\/p>\n

Hours later another contingent of officers hit barricades at the main Admiralty site, using chainsaws to slice through bamboo poles that had been used to reinforce protest cordons following a similar attempt to remove them on Monday.<\/p>\n

Some protesters were seen sobbing.<\/p>\n

“We are only residents and students,” one tearful young woman shouted at police. “We will leave as we are unable to fight you, but we will not give up.”<\/p>\n

[\u2026] Police told reporters that the operation was limited to removing barricades along key traffic routes and that the democracy campaigners would still be given space to express their views. [Source<\/a><\/strong>]<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The rise and fall of the bamboo barricades was documented on Twitter:<\/p>\n

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Last night against the Hong Kong skylight, a fortress of bamboo rises. pic.twitter.com\/fsnDfph0vY<\/a><\/p>\n

— Chris Buckley \u50a8\u767e\u4eae (@ChuBailiang) October 14, 2014<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n