Hong Kong protests: unrest brings new group together to find ways to help city heal
- Local and overseas speakers discuss ways to encourage dialogue, reconciliation
- Members of Hong Kong Forward Alliance say city needs to ‘get out of deadlock’
Perspectives on peace-building from Northern Ireland and South Africa will be part of a full-day forum on Saturday, organised by a group of Hong Kong businesspeople, professionals and academics to help bring the city out of the ongoing unrest now in its sixth month.
About 500 people are expected to attend the public forum – titled “Ways Forward: Let’s Talk and Listen” – organised by the Hong Kong Forward Alliance and funded by donations from individuals, corporations and foundations with support from volunteers.
Entrance is free to the event, at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre in Wan Chai, but attendees will need to register in advance.
Among the overseas speakers will be Clem McCartney, a peace-building expert from Northern Ireland, and Hannes Siebert, a peace process facilitator and former director of the National Peace Secretariat, a multiparty organisation set up to end violence in South Africa in the 1990s.
The organisers hope the overseas perspective will prove insightful in helping to bring about peace in Hong Kong, which has been rocked by increasingly violent protests since June. Triggered by the now-withdrawn extradition bill, the unrest has widened into an anti-government movement.