Breaking News EmailsGet breaking news alerts and special reports. The news and stories that matter, delivered weekday mornings.SUBSCRIBEThe protesters may have won this round, but the fight is far from over.The mass demonstration that flooded downtown Hong Kong on Sunday — the latest in a string of protests over a proposed new extradition law — are an omen for the coming years and even decades, experts say.Organizers claim 2 million people took to the streets against a proposed law that would allow suspected criminals to be extradited from Hong Kong to mainland China. Police said 338,000 protesters followed the rally's original route, but in any case the island’s citizens are pushing back in numbers against what they see as attempts to infringe on their rights.And it worked: A day before the march, in an attempt to dampen the anger, Carrie Lam, Hong Kong's chief executive, formally apologized and announced legislative debates surrounding the bill would be suspended, although not canceled.Ultimately it marked a huge symbolic victory. But the protesters weren't satisfied and are still calling for Lam's resignation and the bill's official withdrawal.So what happens now for Hong Kongers fighting for greater democracy and human rights guarantees? The past week has illuminated the delicate dance between Beijing and Hong Kong, a former British colony that is now a freewheeling capitalist hub with its own laws and financial system.Under its strongman president, Xi Jinping, China has sought to erode Hong Kong's freedoms and tighten its grip on the city, critics say. However, these mass protests are a clear sign that the Beijing government won't be able to do so without considerable resistance."These confrontations are inevitable," says Patricia M. Thornton, an associate professor of Chinese politics at the University of Oxford. "What we saw in Hong Kong, which really is an incredible display of people power, is probably a harbinger of things to come."Former Hong Kong legislator Lee Cheuk-yan told The Associated Press that the activists' mission has become a long-term, not a daily, struggle. "So if Carrie Lam does not respond to the five demands by the protesters, people will come back and the struggle will continue."In the short term, the protests appear to be a significant blow for Xi.Since coming to power in 2013, he has drastically consolidated his personal power and enforced a harsh crackdown on his political opponents that "harked back to the darkest days of post-Tiananmen China," according to Amnesty International.More recently however, he has encountered several key problems: his ongoing trade war with President Donald Trump, worries that the Belt and Road global infrastructure project may become a debt trap, and the international push-back over the technology company Huawei."It will be another source of pressure for him, if we take what has happened in Hong Kong in the broader constellation of some of the unanticipated results he's been facing," s
Hong Kong mass protests are just the start of a wider human rights battle
Breaking News EmailsGet breaking news alerts and special reports. The news and stories that matter, delivered weekday mornings.SUBSCRIBEThe protesters may have won this round, but the fight is far from over.The mass demonstration that flooded downtown Hong Kong on Sunday — the latest in a string of protests over a proposed new extradition law — are an omen for the coming years and even decades, experts say.Organizers claim 2 million people took to the streets against a proposed law that would allow suspected criminals to be extradited from Hong Kong to mainland China. Police said 338,000 protesters followed the rally's original route, but in any case the island’s citizens are pushing back in numbers against what they see as attempts to infringe on their rights.And it worked: A day before the march, in an attempt to dampen the anger, Carrie Lam, Hong Kong's chief executive, formally apologized and announced legislative debates surrounding the bill would be suspended, although not canceled.Ultimately it marked a huge symbolic victory. But the protesters weren't satisfied and are still calling for Lam's resignation and the bill's official withdrawal.So what happens now for Hong Kongers fighting for greater democracy and human rights guarantees? The past week has illuminated the delicate dance between Beijing and Hong Kong, a former British colony that is now a freewheeling capitalist hub with its own laws and financial system.Under its strongman president, Xi Jinping, China has sought to erode Hong Kong's freedoms and tighten its grip on the city, critics say. However, these mass protests are a clear sign that the Beijing government won't be able to do so without considerable resistance."These confrontations are inevitable," says Patricia M. Thornton, an associate professor of Chinese politics at the University of Oxford. "What we saw in Hong Kong, which really is an incredible display of people power, is probably a harbinger of things to come."Former Hong Kong legislator Lee Cheuk-yan told The Associated Press that the activists' mission has become a long-term, not a daily, struggle. "So if Carrie Lam does not respond to the five demands by the protesters, people will come back and the struggle will continue."In the short term, the protests appear to be a significant blow for Xi.Since coming to power in 2013, he has drastically consolidated his personal power and enforced a harsh crackdown on his political opponents that "harked back to the darkest days of post-Tiananmen China," according to Amnesty International.More recently however, he has encountered several key problems: his ongoing trade war with President Donald Trump, worries that the Belt and Road global infrastructure project may become a debt trap, and the international push-back over the technology company Huawei."It will be another source of pressure for him, if we take what has happened in Hong Kong in the broader constellation of some of the unanticipated results he's been facing," s
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