A few dozen people attended the first protest rally authorized in Hong Kong in two years on Sunday: the government had not authorized one for two years, partly as a result of the coronavirus restrictions, but mainly due to the strict control that China’s central government has begun exercising on Hong Kong in recent years. In fact, the demonstration was strongly controlled and limited by the local police, who wanted to inspect all the protest messages in advance and who had asked that the few participants all wear an identification number around their necks, so that they could be recognized at all times.
In addition, the demonstrators have always been within a designated area, so as to always be separated from the journalists present. The police had also imposed that there were no more than 100 participants and that, barring any special permits, none of them wore masks or other things that could cover their faces.
The demonstration was organized to protest against the construction of a waste disposal plant in the eastern part of the city. Talking anonymously with AFP, one of the people present described the conditions imposed by the Hong Kong government as “shameful”; another spoke of a desire to intimidate the few protesters.
Hong Kong is a special administrative region of China: until a few years ago it enjoyed a certain margin of autonomy on numerous internal issues, but above all since 2019 the Chinese government has exercised ever greater control, thanks to the approval of a disputed security law national.
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