This Could Get Ugly

Former deputy police commissioner Alan Lau Yip-shing, now pointedly unretired, certainly knows how to reenter the stage with a big splash—not to mention a crash, bang and boom.

In the week since Lau’s return, the embattled Hong Kong Police Force, whose confidence and morale had been badly shaken by 10 consecutive weeks of increasingly hostile anti-government protests, has seemingly found its swag and stepped up its response to the hit-and-run, guerrilla-style tactics of protesters to new and unprecedented levels.

The outcome has been positively frightening and, if the escalation continues, the consequences could be even more dire.

Thanks to Lau, who oversaw police operations during the 79-day Occupy protests in 2014 and the Mong Kok riot two years later, police have now taken their fight to restore order in Hong Kong into the city’s teeming public transport system, firing tear gas last Sunday at retreating protesters in the Kwai Fong MTR station and shooting pepper balls at another protest contingent inside the station at Taikoo.

Meanwhile, out in the streets, undercover cops masquerading as protesters in signature black T-shirts, face masks and yellow hardhats helped uniformed officers make mass arrests in Causeway Bay, and NOW TV footage appeared to show an officer planting evidence (sharpened bamboo sticks) in the backpack of a man who had been arrested and handcuffed there.

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See Also:

(1) The United States Must Stand Strong with the People of Hong Kong

(2) Thousands in Hong Kong join rallies despite rain; more weekend protests planned

(3) ‘An eye for an eye’: Hong Kong protests get figurehead in woman injured by police

(4) Weary Australian expats consider leaving Hong Kong

(5) Riot police hit the streets of Hong Kong to clear out pro-democracy protesters after days of sabre-rattling by Beijing amid fears China will launch a Tiananmen-style crackdown