Hong Kong police on Sunday permitted a small protest march under tight restrictions in one of the first demonstrations to be approved since the enactment of a sweeping national security law in 2020.
Several dozen demonstrators were required to wear numbered lanyards and were barred from wearing masks, as police monitored their march against a proposed land reclamation and rubbish processing project.
"We need to have a more free-spirited protest culture," said James Ockenden, 49, who was marching with his three children. "Some lawbreakers may mix into the public meeting and procession to disrupt public order or even engage in illegal violence," the police warned in their letter. The last of Hong Kong's COVID restrictions was scrapped this year, following China's decision to end its "zero-COVID" policies.Since the China-imposed national security law, enacted in June 2020 in response to protracted pro-democracy protests in 2019, authorities have clamped down on freedoms and arrested scores of opposition politicians and activists.
"It doesn't mean putting a leash on us to restrict our expression. I think it's acceptable," she told Reuters.
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