Tear gas filled the streets of the densely populated blue-collar neighborhood of Sham Shui Po last night — even after protesters there appeared to have dispersed — as police sought to disperse a peaceful crowd of activists who had gathered near the police station for a political take on the traditional Hungry Ghost Festival.
Yesterday, the fourteenth day of the seventh month in the lunar calendar, marked the Hungry Ghost Festival, a night when many Chinese people burn paper offerings to pay homage to the ghosts and ancestors’ spirits who are traditionally believed to briefly leave the afterlife and visit the living.
To celebrate the occasion, a number of residents and young activists took to the streets near the Sham Shui Po police station to burn joss money printed with the images of senior government officials like Chief Executive Carrie Lam and Police Commissioner Stephen Lo, as well as offerings to those who “sacrificed themselves for the anti-extradition movements,” RTHK reports.
Frances Sit on Twitter: "#antiELAB protesters still burning paper money even though tear gas canisters have just landed across the street in #ShamShuiPo. Very surreal. #HongKongProtests pic.twitter.com/atsA3ZEf8X" / Twitter via /r/FreeHongKongNow https://t.co/4zbO6HLwSr
— James Alexander (@JvmesAlexander) August 15, 2019
While some protesters gathered at the station to chant anti-police slogans and shine laser pointers at the building, they didn’t appear to resort to the kind of stone-throwing and vandalism seen at similar protests in the past.
Nonetheless, at around 9pm, police warned the crowd that they were participating in an unlawful assembly and that they would use “minimum force” to disperse them, according to Apple Daily.
Starting around 9:15pm, riot police fired several rounds of tear gas and began pushing the crowd away along Yen Chow Street, towards the Cheung Sha Wan Government Offices. Scenes from the area showed, among other things, tear gas landing near a fishball stand whose owner was still conducting business, and even appearing to ricochet into a restaurant with an open facade.
Amid tear gas in Sham Shui Po, HKers say: keep calm and eat fish balls.
(Credit: Apple Daily/馬泉崇) pic.twitter.com/9bKmPlGhBD
— Alvin Lum (@alvinllum) August 15, 2019
Police fired a teargas into a restaurant in sham shui Po last night pic.twitter.com/l1k7wvLWIC
— whisper bird (@whisperbird3) August 14, 2019
Somewhat bafflingly, in many of the photos and videos, police appear to be firing tear gas into near-empty streets, and holding up tear gas warning banners with seemingly no protesters in sight.
https://twitter.com/Starz_Aminn/status/1161726183571988481
After firing several rounds of tear gas near the government offices, the police left at around 10:40pm.
Residents soon returned to burn offerings, and the crowd gradually left at midnight.
Some residents, meanwhile, were incensed by police’s use of tear gas, coming out into the streets to yell at police for being “irresponsible.”
https://twitter.com/AntielabH/status/1161692488953806848
“Chemicals are everywhere — in the buildings, MTR stations,” one angry resident said. “We live here! They don’t care about our safety and our lives!”
Some residents also yelled “Are you seeing ghosts?”, asking the police why they would continue to deploy tear gas when most protesters had already left.
Separately, about a hundred protesters also gathered outside the Tin Shui Wai Police Station for a similar demonstration, with some throwing bricks at the building, according to Apple Daily.
Police there also warned the protesters the assembly was illegal at around 11:15pm, and charged out to disperse the crowd about 30 minutes later, Ming Pao reports.
Riot police left the scene after about 10 minutes and people returned to gather outside the station again.
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