This archive report was first published on 18 November 2019.
Published on November 18, 2019, a tense standoff at Hong Kong's Polytechnic University entered its second day, with police firing rubber bullets and tear gas at protesters trying to flee.
At least 38 people were injured in a protracted battle at the university on Sunday, the city's Hospital Authority said, after a bloody battle in which a police officer was struck by an arrow and demonstrators set a police van on fire.
As protests raged across the city, Hong Kong's High Court struck down a contentious ban on the wearing of face masks in public, citing the Basic Law.
The ban, enacted in October, quickly inflamed tensions in the city and set off a series of violent clashes. The city's chief executive, Carrie Lam, imposed the ban without seeking legislative approval by invoking powers granted under the rarely used Emergency Regulations Ordinance.
“The E.R.O. is so wide in its scope, the conferment of powers so complete, its conditions for invocation so uncertain and subjective, the regulations made thereunder invested with such primacy, and the control by the LegCo so precarious, that we believe it is not compatible with the constitutional order laid down by the Basic Law,” the court said in its ruling.
Protesters have worn masks since the early days of the movement, as a way to conceal their identities and protect themselves from the pepper spray and tear gas routinely deployed by the police.
On Monday morning, scores of people were arrested by the police near the university. A large group of arrested people were seen seated outside a hotel in the Tsim Sha Tsui district of Kowloon, their hands zip-tied behind their backs.
Protests are expected to erupt across the city, with demonstrators calling for another strike in support of the campus occupiers. Trains at several sections of the city's rail network have been suspended or delayed.
