Aside from the withdrawal of the bill, the protesters had also demanded an independent probe into the use of force by police; amnesty for arrested protesters; a halt to categorising the protests as riots; and the implementation of universal suffrage.

On Wednesday, Lam said the government would withdraw the bill. Her announcement came after police fired more than 2,350 canisters of tear gas, hundreds of beanbag rounds and sponge grenades, the arrests of 1,183 people and a number of suicides said to be related to the unrest.

Many went on social media and shared a line from Winter on Fire, a documentary on the 2014 Euromaidan uprising in Ukraine: “Our friends that we have lost would never forgive us if we accepted those terms from the government.”

It was a reminder not to end the protests until all their demands were met.

In a statement issued through Telegram – an encrypted messaging app popular with protesters – a group calling itself Guardians of Hong Kong accused the government of buying time to crush the movement by meeting one of the easiest demands.

“Tragedy will repeat itself if the system stays unchanged. We are not giving up after months of protests,” it said.

The Civil Human Rights Front, the pro-democracy umbrella group which has organised three record-breaking marches – said that while Lam has indeed responded to one of its calls, she has “severely misjudged” the situation if she thinks that is enough.

“The frontline young protesters who hope to defend their home, in the absence of alternatives, have defied the law, been arrested, charged with rioting and seriously assaulted,” it said in a statement.

“The cold-blooded tyranny has made us more determined to fight for universal suffrage and we will keep fighting till all five demands are met.”

Over more than three months, the anti-bill campaign morphed into a citywide movement against the government and police force, with escalating use of violence and accusations of police brutality.

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University student Benjamin Tsang, 21, blamed the government for the alleged police brutality and said: “It will be extremely unfair to those arrested or injured if the government only addresses one of our demands.”

For Tsang, a turning point occurred on the night of July 21, when a mob at Yuen Long MTR station attacked passengers and protesters with rods and sticks. Police were criticised for being slow to arrive at the scene, with some accusing the force of acting in collusion with the thugs, a charge the police have denied.

“All this injustice must be addressed with an investigation by an independent commission of inquiry and prosecution, [or else] we’ll never give in,” Tsang said.

A joint study by academics from Chinese University, Baptist University and Lingnan University found 92.8 per cent of 717 respondents who took part in the Tseung Kwan O protest on August 4 felt having an independent probe was “very important”, while 87.3 per cent felt it was “very important” to withdraw the extradition bill completely.

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Raymond Mak Ka-chun, formerly with the moderate think tank Path of Democracy, was among 19 guests invited by Lam to her official residence last week to brainstorm how to initiate a dialogue with those behind the protests.

Mak thought the government’s decision to withdraw the extradition bill would satisfy some Hongkongers, but added: “Protesters are mostly emotionally driven by their conflicts with police officers. I’m not sure the withdrawal alone can achieve the impact the government is looking for.”