Monday, December 1, 2014

HK protest leader begins hunger strike






Student protest leader Joshua Wong enters a tent in Hong Kong on December 2. Wong and two other student demonstrators have begun a hunger strike to demand discussions with Hong Kong's leaders over political reform for the city. Demonstrators want to pressure the government to allow open elections for Hong Kong's chief executive in 2017. Click through for more pictures from the unrest:





































































































































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STORY HIGHLIGHTS


  • Teen protest leader Joshua Wong delcares hunger strike

  • Hong Kong chief executive responds: "Take care of your health"

  • Violent confrontations led to at least 40 arrests Monday




Hong Kong (CNN) -- Hong Kong's teenage protest leader Joshua Wong has begun a hunger strike with two other protesters in his latest attempt to secure talks with the government over protesters' demands for democracy.


"Our humble demand is to ask for dialogue," said Wong, 18, who wants open elections for Hong Kong's next leader. Beijing has said Hong Kong may hold elections, but only if the candidates are nominated by a small committee.


READ MORE: Who is Joshua Wong?


Hong Kong's chief executive C.Y. Leung responded to news of the hunger strike by telling students to "take care of their health, especially in this cold weather." Hong Kong's temperature has dipped to a crisp 15 degrees Celsius (59 Fahrenheit) after months of hot and humid weather.


Protest sputtering





HK leader condemns 'violent radicals'




Hong Kong protesters attempt to escalate




Hong Kong protestors continue to fight

Wong's hunger strike is an attempt to rally a movement which has shown growing signs of fracture. After more than two months of camping out on an eight-lane highway in Hong Kong's Admiralty district, the government has shown no willingness to make concessions and the movement's momentum has sputtered.


Desperate for a breakthrough, student leaders called on supporters to try to surround Hong Kong's government headquarters Sunday night, leading to a violent nighttime standoff with police in which protesters were bloodied and ultimately beaten back.


The next morning, police briefly moved on the main protest site, removing some tents, banners, and barricades before withdrawing.


Student leader Alex Chow, 24, of the Hong Kong Federation of Students bowed his head in an apology to supporters Monday.


"We aimed to disrupt the operation of the government... but the plan had room to improve and in a sense it failed."


Before dawn Monday, at least 40 arrests had been made in Admiralty, according to the Hong Kong Police. A further 12 people were also arrested in Mong Kok.


The Central Government Office was closed on Monday morning but later re-opened.


The government said it condemned "violent radicals," saying they had "provoked and verbally abused police officers" and encouraged others to charge police lines.


Protesters: "We are all tired"


Wong was briefly arrested last week as police forcefully cleared Hong Kong's second-largest protest site in the working class neighborhood of Mong Kok. Now as the main protest site comes under threat, protesters have been at a loss for how to best respond.


Arguments broke out Monday between student leaders and demonstrators after police made an incursion into the tent city. Winnie Ng, a demonstrator, told CNN "We do not have any plan."





Police crack down on Hong Kong protests




Authorities clear Hong Kong protest site




Lai: It's time for protesters to retreat

The middle-aged orginators of the Occupy movement have called on students to withdraw and think of a new strategy, citing opinion polls that show low support for the street occupations.


On the other hand, grassroots demonstrators have argued the movement should escalate its physical confrontations with the government.


Reactions were mixed to Wong's announcement of the hunger strike.


"Kid, you're too young. You think (Hong Kong's leader) will give you real universal suffrage because of a hunger strike?" said one commenter.


Other democracy supporters accused Wong of staging the hunger strike as a way of achieving a "glorious retreat" without accomplishing anything.


An online statement issued by Wong's protest group, Scholarism, acknowledged the hunger strike was a desperate measure. "We are all tired, our hearts are weary; as we face this high wall of a government we are like a weak, frail, egg," it said.


"But we are not afraid of people laughing at our dreams; we are afraid of hearing the sounds of our broken dreams in the future, afraid of having no more dreams at all."


Scholarism is not new to hunger strikes: In 2012, members of the group staged a hunger strike outside Hong Kong's government headquarters to oppose a proposed pro-Communist high school curriculum.


After vocal protests from thousands of supporters, officials eventually withdrew the plan.


CNN's Ivan Watson, Vivian Kam, Esther Pang, Anjali Tsui, Steven Jiang, and Bex Wright contributed reporting.













from CNN.com - Top Stories http://ift.tt/1yzpDZ9

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