This archive report was first published on 20 November 2019.
As the city's reputation for prosperity and stability is shattered by the unrest, the Hong Kong government has called for protesters to surrender, with those over 18 facing rioting charges and minors being let go.
However, hardcore protesters have held off riot police with Molotov cocktails, bricks, and arrows, with around 50 of them remaining at the campus after hundreds had fled deteriorating conditions.
Among the arrested were two protesters who were held on Wednesday as they tried to emerge from a sewer outside the campus, a sign of the desperate measures being taken to break the police cordon.
The protest movement began over a now-shelved bill to allow extraditions to China, which revived fears that Beijing was slicing into the city's freedoms.
Millions of angry citizens have hit the streets in a movement that snowballed into wider calls for free elections and an inquiry into alleged police brutality, demands that Hong Kong's Beijing-appointed leaders have rebuffed.
The city's economy has been tipped into recession, and a slew of major sporting and entertainment events have been pulled due to the crisis.
Organisers have postponed next week's Hong Kong Open, one of Asia's oldest golf tournaments, because of the crisis.
The UN human rights office has expressed deepening concern over the situation, with spokesman Rupert Colville acknowledging protesters' deep-seated grievances but condemning the extreme violence of some demonstrators.
Colville called on authorities to seek a peaceful resolution, while the US Senate has passed new legislation threatening to revoke Hong Kong's favourable trade status if its freedoms are quashed.
Beijing has repeatedly condemned protesters as violent criminals and rejected any foreign criticism, but the US Senate has also approved a measure that would ban sales of tear gas, rubber bullets, and other equipment used by Hong Kong security forces.
