Violence spills across Hong Kong New Territories

Hong Kong police fired tear gas to break up rallies as black-clad activists blocked roads and trashed shopping malls across the New Territories yesterday on the 24th straight weekend of anti-government protests. Pro-democracy protesters vandalised a train station in the central new town of Sha Tin and smashed up a restaurant perceived as being pro-Beijing, overturning banqueting tables and smashing glass panels, two weeks before district council elections in the Chinese-ruled city.

Violence spilled out onto the streets of Tuen Mun outside the “V city” mall, with running battles between riot police and protesters. Now TV showed pictures of a circular, red welt and bruise on the upper arm of one of its reporters who said she had been hit by a tear gas canister in Tsuen Wan, to the west of the New Territories.

The rail station was closed in Sha Tin, amid scuffles between police and protesters young and old, on a day of planned shopping mall protests throughout the territory. Shopping districts across the harbour on the main island were quiet. “Radical protesters have been gathering in multiple locations across the territories,” police said in a statement.