‘Litter-picking’ troops flex Xi’s muscles on HK streets

As elections approach, the deployment of elite forces outside their barracks has sent a stark message to pro-democracy protesters.

Stark message: Troops from the People's Liberation Army barracks in Hong Kong emerged to help clean up on Saturday. Picture: AFP

Fresh violence erupted on Sunday around a besieged Hong Kong university campus as protesters braced for a possible final police push to clear them after fiery clashes overnight on Saturday.

Huge fires had lit up the night sky at Hong Kong Polytechnic University in Kowloon district hours earlier as protesters hurled petrol bombs, some by catapult, and police fired volleys of teargas to force them up on to the podium of the red-brick campus.

After a few quiet hours as protesters slept on lawns and in the university library, police fired fresh rounds of teargas shortly after 10am on Sunday.

Activists hurled petrol bombs in return, some igniting trees outside the campus.

The campus is the last of five universities to be occupied, with activists using it as a base to continue to block the city’s central cross-harbour road tunnel.

Hours earlier, squads of Chinese soldiers dressed in shorts and T-shirts, some carrying red plastic buckets or brooms, emerged from their barracks in a rare public ­appearance to help residents clear debris blocking key roads.

The presence of China’s People’s Liberation Army soldiers on the streets, even to help clean up, could stoke further controversy over Hong Kong’s autonomous status at a time many fear Beijing is tightening its grip on the city.

Hong Kong did not request ­assistance from the PLA and the military initiated the operation as a “voluntary community activity”, a spokesman for the city’s government said.

Pro-democracy politicians condemned the PLA’s actions in a joint statement, warning that under the city’s Garrison Law, the military must not interfere in local affairs unless it was asked by the government to help with disaster relief or public order.

As soon as the 50 soldiers, in olive green T-shirts and shorts, jogged out from their base on late on Saturday afternoon, it was clear this was much more than a simple “civic duty” exercise.

It was quickly noted the wording on their shirts indicated that they were members of a rapid reaction brigade based in western China, the region that includes the restive Muslim provinces of Xinjiang. The appearance of any PLA troops — let alone elite special forces based 3200km away – on the streets of Hong Kong was in the eyes of many locals a jarring display of Beijing’s power to intervene in the territory’s affairs.

Whether Chinese President Xi Jinping will order a military intervention in Hong Kong to combat the greatest challenge to communist rule since the PLA crushed the Tiananmen Square democracy protests in 1989 has been much debated. For now, Mr Xi seems to have settled for ordering Carrie Lam, the embattled Chief Executive of the supposedly autonomous territory handed over to China by Britain in 1997, to take a harder line against protesters after a recent summons to Beijing. After her return, she labelled the demonstrators “enemies of the people”. Saturday’s PLA deployment was far from sending in the tanks but delivered a stark message.

Since the handover, PLA soldiers have made only one previous appearance on the streets. That was last year when they helped clear fallen trees after a ­typhoon battered the city. It was regarded as a public relations ­exercise, and Hong Kong officials brushed aside questions.

In normal times, the removal of debris and clearing streets are the responsibility of the territory’s district councils. Next weekend, Hong Kong’s voters are due to choose their district councillors in local elections, but when, or if, they go to the polls, they will have something very different from parochial priorities on their minds — namely the showdown between democracy campaigners and the world’s most powerful ­authoritarian regime.

The elections are, for now, still scheduled to go ahead, with the opposition expected to make gains in the only barometer of public opinion away from the streets. Rumours abound that Mr Xi will order Ms Lam to postpone the poll — and avert the risk of an embarrassing display of dissent — under the pretext of security concerns.

Reuters, The Sunday Times