Hong Kong: Man stabbed, protesters to organise unauthorised march

On October 20, as Hong Kong anti-government demonstrators were preparing to organise an unauthorised rally, a citizen who was distribution leaflets near a wall with pro-democracy messages was reportedly stabbed and wounded. According to the police officials, they had arrested a 22-year-old man on October 19 for his connection with the knife attack that wounded the 19-year-old. The leader of five-month anti-government protests, Jimmy Sham was attacked by assailants wielding hammers and knives as the demonstrations escalated into violence. 

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Unauthorised march

The protest organisers have planned a march on October 20, even though it has not got permission from the police authorities after citing the risks in public order. Later on Saturday, supporters were reportedly waving flags of the United States and the United Kingdom in order to ask for support from the foreign countries to help their cause. The demonstrators are trying to maintain their pressure on the government in order to address their demands which also includes Hong Kong's full democracy along with independent inquiry for police brutality. The march also has an agenda to scrap the ban which was installed earlier on wearing masks at public gatherings. 

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Defy the Police

The organisers of the demonstrations say that they will defy the police because according to Hong Kong's constitution they have the right to protest. 

“We don’t think that because police haven’t given their approval we shouldn’t demonstrate,” Figo Chan, vice-convener of the Civil Human Rights Front, told reporters. “Even though they have rejected our appeal, there will surely be many residents taking to the streets.” 

US lawmakers condemn Apple and Activision Blizzard

While the pro-democracy protests are still ongoing in the city, a bipartisan group of US lawmakers, Republican Sen. Ted Cruz and Democratic Rep. Alexandra Ocasio Cortez even wrote to a tech company, Apple along with video game studio Activision Blizzard in order to condemn the protest-related censorship on behalf of China. The group further has urged Apple to reverse its decision to remove its app store the crowdsourced mapping app HKMaplive which is used to report the police locations in the city. Similarly, they addressed the issue of Activision Blizzard suspending a Hong Kong gamer after he voiced support for the demonstrators during an interview. 

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“Cases like these raise real concerns about whether Apple and other large U.S. entities will bow to growing Chinese demands rather than lose access to more than a billion Chinese consumers,” said the letter sent Friday and co-signed by Sens. Marco Rubio and Ron Wyden and Reps. Mike Gallagher and Tom Malinowski. 

The lawmakers even cited Beijing's pressure on the NBA after Houston Rockets general manager Daryl Morey's take on Twitter to support the anti-government protests. On the night of October 18, few basketball fans also held signs, wore shirts and even chanted in support of the Hong Kong protests. One of the signs also called out LeBron James and Joe Tsai, the co-founder of Alibaba who expressed their criticism over the tweet. Tsai further explained why the now-deleted tweet had affected China. 

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(With AP inputs)