Hong Kong police arrested at least 289 protestors on Sunday, as they assembled on the day the local elections were supposed to be held. Elections were postponed for at least a year, and officials pointed to the pandemic as the reason for moving the election date.
Police officers used pepper spray against protestors, and some of the arrests were made by plainclothes police officers. One activist was even arrested in his home on Sunday for “uttering seditious words”, whilst footage of officers tackling a 12-year-old girl to the ground also went viral.
Pro-democracy groups push back on this reasoning, saying that elections were postponed due to the increasing support for pro-democracy candidates and groups.
This all comes after the imposition of a new national security law in June, which has been used to quell dissent across Hong Kong in recent months. Sunday’s protest was the largest gathering since the new laws were implanted by China.
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