'You're being watched': Hong Kong police warn activists planning protests ahead of political reform vote
As tension mounts ahead of vote on electoral reform, senior police officer issues warning to those planning protests or occupations
Online activists who plan to stoke illegal street protests or occupations using social media ahead of next week's landmark vote on political reform have received a stark "you're being watched" warning by police.
Senior officers say it is part of a no-nonsense approach designed to prevent a repeat of last year's Occupy movement while respecting the right to protest.
The warning, delivered by assistant commissioner of police Cheung Tak-keung yesterday, came as he revealed that an ongoing internal investigation into how the police handled last year's Occupy turmoil had changed the way police would approach protests in the run-up to the vote.
"We are still reviewing our operations ... and have taken note of comments from our officers. In this coming operation, we've already introduced some changes and we hope we can do better. The last operation gave us some insight and some ideas on how to improve," said Cheung.
About 50,000 protesters are expected to gather in Victoria Park tomorrow before marching to the Legislative Council headquarters in Admiralty at the start of five days of protests. More than 7,000 police equipped with anti-riot gear have been mobilised as part of the operation codenamed Solarpeak Two.
While rally organisers have vowed that the demonstration will not escalate into a replay of Occupy, police are paying special attention to online activities.
"Recently, police have found messages on the internet advocating violent protest," Cheung said. "Some organisations even indicated that they would resort to violent acts to demonstrate and express their demands during public order events."
He added that "most laws in the real world are applicable to the cyberworld" and that anyone who used a computer to encourage or incite others to commit illegal acts "must bear the consequences and criminal liability".
Two weeks ago, a member of radical political group People Power, Tam Tak-chi, was arrested on suspicion of "accessing a computer with criminal or dishonest intent" over a Facebook post about the funeral of Yeung Kwong, a Beijing loyalist and organiser of leftist riots in 1967. The post suggested greeting the hearse with "pineapples" - a code for bombs in the 1967 riots.
Cheung also acknowledged the need to regain public trust, in light of a poll this week by the University of Hong Kong that found confidence in the police force had slumped to the lowest levels since the handover in 1997.
"We know that public support and confidence is very important and we have been doing a lot of work on this," Cheung said.
Police have also set a deadline of noon today for activists camped outside Legco to remove objects from their tents such as planks, nails and bottles.
Ahead of the vote, a High Court judge yesterday told a litigant he could pursue a judicial review of government ads urging people to back the proposal for limited democracy in 2017.
Last night Zhang Xiaoming , director of Beijing's liaison office, described as "absurd" rumours the central government might use HK$300 million to bribe pan-democratic legislators to vote for the reform package.