A senior police spokesperson has said that a vicious attack on protesters and commuters that took place on July 21 at Yuen Long MTR station was caused by a “group of people leading protesters” to the area.
The comments were made by senior superintendent Kong Wing-cheung — the number two at the Police Public Relations Bureau — who was appearing on a Cable News 2019 retrospective program that aired on Sunday evening. A news report by the broadcaster revealed that the interview took place two weeks ago on Dec. 18.
The incident — which is often referred to as the “721 incident” — saw dozens of people injured after a group of men in white shirts turned up at the train station and began to indiscriminately beat up commuters, reporters, and protesters returning from a rally on Hong Kong Island that day.
Police took more than 40 minutes to respond to calls for help, and video from that evening showed two police officers leaving the train station while dozens of white-shirted men gathered in the station.
In the program, when asked by the interviewer why two officers “ran away” from the scene, Kong responded: “I wouldn’t say at the time that they were running away, because I think everyone needs to look at the bigger picture.”
He then went on to say: “There was a group of people leading protesters to Yuen Long to cause trouble.”
Kong didn’t name names, but his comments echo an allegation made by pro-Beijing firebrand Junius Ho, who claimed that pro-democracy lawmaker Lam Cheuk-ting was behind the attack, which is ironic given that Ho was filmed on the night of the attack glad-handing several men believed to have taken part, and later referred to their values as “heroic.”
Earlier today, Lam — who cut his lip and fractured his arm during the 721 incident — held a press conference accusing Kong of trying to distort the truth about the attack, and in one Facebook post published today called Kong “Junius Ho 2.0.”
He also said he would send a letter to Police Commissioner Chris Tang to urge him to clarify the matter, and would move a motion to invoke the Legislative Council’s powers to investigate police conduct.
“Mr Kong publicly told lies and tried to shift the blame from the police force to the victims of the Yuen Long attack. It is extremely shameless and horrible. I doubt whether the police force can conduct an investigation against those attackers. Most of them are probably triad members,” Lam said.
When pressed by reporters at this afternoon’s daily press briefing if he was referring specifically to Lam, Kong didn’t deny making the comments saying that he talked about many other things and that “the part you mentioned was only one of the many answers I gave. Please do not take it out of context, as I said you can’t draw a conclusion from the certain snapshot that you see.”
He reiterated that police are still looking into the case and have so far arrested 37 people (of which seven have been formally charged), that the case has been transferred to the District Court, and that he had no further comments on the reports as criminal procedures are ongoing.
He added that his conclusion in the TV programme interview wouldn’t necessarily match that of the force as a whole, given that an investigation into the incident is still being carried out.
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