A10| Tuesday, September 3, 2019 ***** THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
her and her husband more
sympathetic to the young peo-
ple’s cause.
More than 1,100 protesters,
one just 12 years old, have been
arrested in the past three
months. Most are on bail await-
ing to hear their charges, but
could face yearslong sentences.
A law that would allow sus-
pects to be extradited to China
kicked off the dissent in Hong
Kong on June 9. Early marches
were large and mostly peaceful.
On June 12, the police began
using tear gas and rubber bul-
lets during skirmishes with
protesters, raising tensions.
Days later, the government sus-
pended the extradition bill—its
only concession to date.
On July 1, residents watched
in shock as protesters stormed
the city’s legislature, breaking
windows and vandalizing the
chamber—one of the first real
radical turns by protesters.
This past weekend, the streams
showed chanting protesters
hurling Molotov cocktails and
setting a number of fires.Violent arrests
The police have also become
more aggressive. Last month,
undercover officers dressed in
black made violent arrests in
the shopping district of Cause-
way Bay. Live-stream cameras
focused on one protester,
pinned to the ground by an of-
ficer’s knee on his neck and his
face covered with blood,
screaming that his front tooth
had been knocked out. Hong
Kong has watched police charge
into subway stations with ba-
tons and tear gas, chasing after
suspects. Water cannons have
joined the fight, firing jets of
blue-dyed water to mark pro-
testers for future arrest.
Sunny, the wife of a police
officer in her late 20s, says the
two have been fighting for
weeks about how the police
have handled the protests. She
often shows her husband video
clips of police assailing protest-
ers and has texted him while
he’s on duty to say: “Hey.
Please think before you act out
there,” worried about what
could happen in the heat of the
moment.
The little time they’ve seen
each other during the busy
summer, it has been the onlytopic they discuss, she says.
Her husband maintains that po-
lice are doing what is necessary
to keep law and order, she says,
while she’s upset that his job
requires him to not take a po-
litical stance.
Sunny blames the govern-
ment for failing to start talks
and seek a political solution.
There has been little dialogue
between the government and
the opposition as protests enter
their 14th week.
“The government has
thrown the police out there as
a shield,” Sunny says. She sup-
ports an independent inquiry
into police handling of the pro-
tests, a key demand of the pro-
testers’ side. She says it might
help heal the deep wounds be-
tween the two sides.
The police can deploy as
many as 3,000 officers
equipped with riot gear on the
streets, with hundreds more
able to be called up in reserve.
More than 1,600 police officers
and their family members have
had their personal information
made public, leading in some
cases to death threats and
abuse, the force has said.
Protesters have laid siege to
police residences. Sunny often
can’t sleep for worry that their
daughter, in elementary school,
might be targeted. She doesn’t
let her daughter run off to the
park swings like she used to.
Sunny says if their information
were leaked, she would con-
sider keeping her daughter at
home from school.
“There is so much sadness,
so much hate among our com-
munity right now,” she says.
“We shouldn’t be divided into
two sides.” Her husband de-
clined to be interviewed.
While protesters at the front
lines of battles with police are
mostly young, support of the
opposition movement goes
across generations. Public ap-
proval and trust of the govern-
ment has dropped to record
lows since China resumed sov-
ereignty over the former Brit-
ish colony in 1997.
There are just over 2.6 mil-
lion households in Hong Kong,
official data shows. A rally on
Aug. 18 drew an estimated 1.
million people, almost a quar-
ter of the city’s 7.4 million peo-
ple. One on June 16 drew 2 mil-
lion.representatives. The magistrate
said their parents couldn’t keep
them in check, and a protection
order was needed to keep them
safe.
Edith, a 59-year-old janitor
and single mother, learned as
she was getting ready for bed
on July 28 that her youngest
daughter, Charlie, had been de-
tained at a demonstration.
Multiple live streams cap-
tured the images of police rip-
ping off her mask and pinning
her to the ground. Friends
watching the footage peppered
Charlie’s sister, Christine, with
calls and WhatsApp messages.
“I think...your sister was just
arrested,” one read.
Christine frantically called
Charlie, but her phone had
been confiscated by police. She
hesitated to worry their mom,
thinking Charlie might be re-
leased shortly. A few hours
later, she called her mother.
The family spent the whole
night calling around police sta-
tions. They didn’t know it at
the time, but in the course of
her arrest Charlie had ticked a
box instructing police not to
alert her family for fear her
mother would worry.
Police picked up more than
40 people in that episode, and
many sat with Charlie through
the early hours of the morning
in a parking lot at the police
station, waiting to be pro-
cessed. By the time Charlie was
allowed to make a phone call
for legal assistance—to the
number she had written on her
arm before the demonstra-
tion—her family had found out
where she was and arranged
for representation.
Charlie faces one of the
most serious charges brought
against protesters—that of riot-
ing, which carries a maximum
jail sentence of 10 years. The
charges were first brought a
day after Beijing publicly pres-
sured Hong Kong authorities
for tougher treatment to quell
the uprising.
Charlie’s arrest has largely
been a taboo topic at home. At
dinners, Edith’s daughters
brush off her fears, telling her
they can deal with a sentence
when it comes, that maybe au-
thorities will be lenient. When
she is alone in her bedroom,
Edith thinks of nothing else.
She barely sleeps.“She had her whole future
ahead of her,” Edith said of
Charlie, a university student
who aspires to work in the arts.
“I can’t begin to think what the
future will be like for her now.”
In an interview, sobbing for
the first time in front of her
daughters since Charlie’s ar-
rest, Edith questioned what she
sees as the government’s indif-
ference. “How can they not un-
derstand? Why have they
driven their kids to this?”Family quarrels
Jamie, an 18-year-old stu-
dent, has had countless quar-
rels at home about her partici-
pation in the protests. She says
her parents want to give her
the freedom to do what she be-
lieves is right, but as the vio-
lence has escalated and the
possible prison sentences have
gone up, they are finding it
harder to let her go.
On Aug. 11, a protester suf-
fered a bad eye injury after be-
ing hit with some kind of pro-
jectile. Her face filled TV
screens and blood soaked
through her bandages as med-
ics provided aid. Jamie’s father,
who has business in China and
doesn’t support the protests,
asked, “If that was you, how
could we go on?”
Jamie has learned how to
hide where she’s going from
her parents. She often discards
her helmet and goggles before
coming home and skips buying
meals so she can afford new
protective gear before the next
clash.
On Aug. 5, as the city saw
some of the worst clashes yet,
her parents told her to come
home immediately or don’t
bother coming back. Jamie says
she was determined to keep
protesting, so stayed over with
a friend. At 3 a.m., her sister
texted her. “Mom says come
home,” she wrote. “Please. She
just wants to see you.”
She went back. The next
morning, her mother came into
her room to gather laundry, as
she usually does.
“You will do what you will
do,” Jamie says her mother told
her. “But please, always re-
member that your father and I
will always be worrying about
your safety. We just want to
know that you’ll be OK.”Carmen Chan, a 39-year-old
nonprofit worker, has found it
difficult to explain the direction
protests have taken to her 9-
year-old daughter, whom she
has brought to several of the
larger peaceful marches. Mrs.
Chan says she is against violent
protests as well as against po-
lice officers’ use of force in ar-
rests.
The two were so upset by a
particularly brutal episode of
violence they saw on TV one
night, in which a mob attacked
protesters, that they bumped
into each other in the bath-room at 2 a.m., unable to sleep.
They had a long, teary conver-
sation right there.
“I didn’t know how to com-
fort her, because I don’t know
how to deal with this either,”
Mrs. Chan says.
After a 13-year-old and 15-
year-old were arrested on the
way home from an outdoor po-
litical movie screening Thurs-
day, a local juvenile court or-
dered them to be immediately
removed from their families’
care and placed in government
care against the families’
wishes, according to their legalCity of Discontent
Percentageofthepopulation
whoaresatisfiedwiththe
overallperformanceofthe
HongKonggovernment.Source: Hong Kong Public Opinion Research
Institute50010203040%2015 2016 2017 2018 2019‘My heart never
stops racing until
he’s home,’ says one
mother.WORLD NEWS
Jamie, an 18-year-old student, has had countless quarrels with her parents about her participation in protests.guns in self-defense, of fires
glowing through the tear gas.
Nearly four months of wide-
spread street protests largely
fueled by a younger generation
demanding limits on China’s
authority have disrupted daily
life in the city and created a
political crisis. It is also exact-
ing a much more personal toll,
causing turmoil at home and
within families as the violence
escalates.
Many parents, used to de-
cades of peace and stability,
worry about the safety and fu-
ture of their children as they
take to the streets. Some fami-
lies are locked in arguments
over the direction the protests
have taken—or argue over the
purpose of the protests alto-
gether. Some parents are turn-
ing against the government and
police as the city’s young pro-
testers are violently arrested
and blame officials for not do-
ing enough to defuse tensions.
This weekend saw some of
the fiercest clashes yet, and on
Monday, thousands of high
school and university students
boycotted classes.
The Lius, a couple in their
50s, have a son in his 20s on
the front lines. Mrs. Liu, who
works as a caregiver at a nurs-
ing facility, fought with him
when he first became involved
in politics a few years ago. She
initially pleaded with him to
stay home this summer, but de-
cided there’s no point getting
into shouting matches.
Up all night
The Lius suspect their son is
on the streets most of the time,
though he is vague about his
plans. When he is out, they stay
up all night waiting for him to
come home. Mr. Liu, a store
manager, paces around the
house asking his wife every few
minutes whether he has texted.
Their son is more likely to reply
to her than to him.
They keep his social media
accounts up, taking heart when
his WhatsApp status says, “On-
line.” They have the TV on, and
Mrs. Liu is on her phone and
computer, too, constantly
checking for news.
The Hong Kong media make
it easy to follow the action.
Dozens of yellow-vested report-
ers and camera operators posi-
tion themselves in the most
dangerous spots between the
protesters and the police,
broadcasting live video. Some-
times the Lius scan the live
streams looking for their son.
Every now and then they think
they spot him, but with every-
one covered in masks and hel-
mets it can be hard to be sure.
“We’re looking for him, but
of course, in a way, we hope
not to find him,” Mrs. Liu says.
“My heart never stops racing
until he’s home.”
Bad news came on July 14,
when Mrs. Liu was out for din-
ner with her brothers and sis-
ters. She discovered she had
missed a dozen calls from her
husband. Her son had been ar-
rested. The police later came to
search their house.
What really terrifies Mrs.
Liu is that her son, now re-
leased and back home, will be
injured in the worsening vio-
lence. Mrs. Liu says she has
never been a political person,
but the toughening police re-
sponse and the government’s
continued silence on addressing
the protesters’ demands makes
ContinuedfromPageOne
Clashes
Divide
Families
HONG KONG—Government
authorities had hoped that the
unrest and upheaval of the past
few months would recede after
youthful protesters returned to
school on Monday. Thousands
of students proved them wrong
by boycotting class.
Students at dozens of high
schools across the city partici-
pated in protests, dressing in
black or uniforms, carrying
placards and forming human
chains outside schools as a
new term began.
At the alma mater of Carrie
Lam, the city’s chief executive,
secondary school students
held signs saying, “Chief Exec-
utive: Are you willing to listen
to the voices of the little sis-
ters from your school?”
University students also be-
gan a boycott—organizers es-
timated 30,000 people at-
tended a rally at the Chinese
University of Hong Kong—
while a general strike from a
cross-section of industries had
been called for Monday and
Tuesday. Hundreds of school-
children rallied in the central
business district, near a strike
rally, while riot police pa-
trolled subway stations during
the morning commuter rush,
making some arrests as pro-
testers tried to obstruct train
doors and disrupt passengers.
Tensions rose over the
weekend, when the city saw
some of its fiercest clashes be-
tween protesters and police.
On Saturday, a fire raged near
the city’s police headquarters
and police shot volleys of tear
gas to disperse crowds, whileaccess to the airport was ef-
fectively shut down for several
hours on Sunday.
Although clashes were in-
tense, tens of thousands peace-
fully occupied main roads Sat-
urday to march in defiance of a
police ban on a mass antigov-
ernment rally, underscoring
widespread public unhappiness
with the city’s government.
The arrests of eight opposi-
tion figures on Friday served
only to galvanize demonstrators.
Initially ignited by an extradi-
tion bill that would have allowed
criminal suspects to be sent to
China for trial, the protests have
since become a broader move-
ment as the government has
made few concessions.
As the city enters its fourth
month of an uprising, there are
no signs tensions will cool off.
There are no public signs of di-
alogue between officials andprotesters toward a resolution.
Student leaders say they will
escalate their actions on Sept.
13, if Mrs. Lam doesn’t respond
to their demands.
Brian, 15, said he was partic-
ipating in his first protest be-
cause this one was focused on
attracting secondary students
like himself. “I came straight
from school because I have a
responsibility to come out and
express my views,” he said.
“Hong Kong is my home. It’s a
beautiful city, but the beauty of
it is slowly being destroyed by
politicians.”
Chief Secretary Matthew
Cheung, the city’s No. 2 rank-
ing official, said the govern-
ment opposed any class boy-
cott, which would disrupt
schools. “Schools are abso-
lutely not places for express-
ing political views or de-
mands,” Mr. Cheung said.ByNatasha Khan,
Steven Russolilloand
Joyu WangHong Kong Students Boycott Class to Join Protests
ANTHONY KWAN FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNALLeader Says She
Didn’t Offer to QuitHong Kong’s embattled
chief executive, Carrie Lam,
said she has never tendered
her resignation to Beijing and
is committed to leading the
city out of its monthslong po-
litical crisis.
On Tuesday, Mrs. Lam said
she was disappointed that de-
tails of a closed-door meeting
with businesspeople last week
were leaked to the media.
On Monday, Reuters re-
ported that Mrs. Lam told at-
tendees that her first choice
would be to quit if she could.
She added, according to a re-
cording of the meeting re-
leased by Reuters, that shehad limited room for political
maneuvering to resolve the im-
passe in Hong Kong because
the issue has been elevated to
a national level with regards to
sovereignty and security.
There is no expectation
that the turmoil can end be-
fore the 70th anniversary of
the People’s Republic of China
on Oct. 1, Mrs. Lam said in the
recording. It was unforgivable
that she had caused such
havoc, she said in the record-
ing. On Tuesday, Mrs. Lam said
she had “shared some private,
emotional feelings.”
The city is entering a
fourthmonthofprotestsover
a bill, proposed by Mrs. Lam,
that would have allowed peo-
ple to be extradited to China.
—Joyu Wang
and Natasha Khan