The police will grant the organizers a ‘no objection’ letter on the condition that they ensure that the protest does not violate national security laws.
Hong Kong police have allowed a small protest march under strict restrictions in one of the first demonstrations approved since the enactment of a sweeping national security law in 2020.
Several dozen protesters on Sunday were required to wear numbered lanyards and banned from wearing masks as police oversaw their march against a proposed land reclamation and waste disposal project.
Participants chanted slogans against the land reclamation project as they marched in the rain with banners in the eastern district of Tseung Kwan O, where the project is to be built.
Some criticized restrictions on their protest, including limiting the number of participants to 100, according to a seven-page letter from police to organizers, seen by Reuters.
“We need a more free-spirited culture of protest,” said James Ockenden, 49, who marched with his three children.
“But this is all pre-arranged and numbered and it just destroys the culture and will definitely deter people from coming.”
In response to the protest, the city’s Development Office said the project was intended to “support the day-to-day needs of the community”.
It said it would “respect the right to freedom of expression” and study the possibility of reducing the scale of the land reclamation.
Police granted the organizers a “no objection” letter on the condition that they ensure the protest would not violate any national security laws, including inflammatory speech or speech.
“Some lawbreakers may interfere with the public gathering and procession to disrupt public order or even engage in illegal violence,” the police warned in their letter.
Police watch protesters walking with tags in a cordon at a rally in Hong Kong (Louise Delmotte/AP)
Organizers said up to 50 people took part in the first protest in years approved by the city’s police.
Requests for other protests, including a June 4 candlelight vigil to commemorate the victims of the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown in China, have been rejected on grounds related to COVID social distancing.
Hong Kong’s last COVID restrictions were removed this year, following China’s decision to end its “zero-COVID” policy.
Hong Kong’s mini-constitution, the Basic Law, guarantees the right to public assembly.
Since the national security law imposed by China, which came into effect in June 2020 in response to ongoing pro-democracy protests in 2019, authorities have curbed freedoms and arrested numerous politicians and opposition activists.
Watch demonstrations
Some Western governments have criticized the law as a tool of repression, but Chinese authorities say it has restored stability to the financial center.
A protester named Chiu, 50, said she appreciated the chance to protest “in difficult times” and said she saw the lanyards more as a means of facilitating crowd management.
“It doesn’t mean we have to go on a leash to limit our expression. I think it’s acceptable,” she told Reuters.
Political observers and some Western diplomats are looking to see if authorities will allow a resumption of major demonstrations in Hong Kong, namely on June 4 and July 1, which have been a mainstay of the city’s once-vibrant civil society and attracted thousands of people.
Earlier this month, the Hong Kong Women Workers’ Association planned a march to call for labor and women’s rights, but canceled it at the last minute without specifying why.
Days later, the association said on its Facebook page that the police had invited it to further meetings after granting its approval and that it had done its best to amend the agreement. But it still couldn’t launch the protest as it would have liked, it wrote at the time.
A pro-democracy group said separately that the National Security Police had warned four of its members not to participate in the association’s march.
Dozens of people took part in Hong Kong’s first anti-government demonstration allowed since major COVID restrictions were lifted under unprecedentedly strict rules (Louise Delmotte/AP)