Chief Executive Carrie Lam and and Police Commissioner Stephen Lo visited the Kowloon Mosque this morning, one day after the entrance to the building was stained bright blue by dyed, pepper spray-laced water fired from a high-pressure police cannon.
The pair arrived at the mosque at about 11:15am for a meeting with chief imam Muhammad Arshad and left some 20 minutes later without speaking to the press.
Speaking to reporters outside the mosque, representatives of the mosque said that they had a “candid and balanced discussion, the police explained clearly that the incident that happened yesterday was not intentional.”
They avoided questions from reporters as to whether or not they believed that those standing outside the mosque at the time of the incident were “rioters,” and thanked those who helped to clean the mosque yesterday afternoon.
The incident took place yesterday during a police dispersal operation on Nathan Road after a large number of protesters gathered in Tsim Sha Tsui for an unsanctioned march.
Police yesterday evening issued a statement saying that they sprayed the mosque by accident and they were in fact targeting “rioters” outside the building.
Video circulating online, however, shows that at the time the water cannon fired, there was only a small number of people outside, mostly journalists and peaceful protesters holding placards telling people not to target the mosque.
Protesters yesterday were keen to make unity and solidarity with the city’s South Asian community a theme amid fears minorities would be targeted following the attack on Civil Human Rights Front convenor Jimmy Sham last week, allegedly carried out by at least four men of South Asian descent.
