Two months into Hong Kong’s political crisis, the faceless, leaderless protest movement has found a figurehead: a young woman who may be blind in one eye because of the police.
On Sunday, amid clashes between police and protesters in Tsim Sha Tsui in Kowloon, footage emerged of a woman, believed to be a volunteer medic, lying on the ground with blood streaming from her right eye. What appeared to be a beanbag round was lodged in a set of goggles on the ground in front of her.
Her injury, a symbol of what protesters say are increasingly brutal tactics against Hong Kong citizens, has galvanised the protest movement as it enters its 11th week.
Quick GuideWhat are the Hong Kong protests about?
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Why are people protesting?
The protests were triggered by a controversial bill that would have allowed extraditions to mainland China, where the Communist party controls the courts, but have since evolved into a broader pro-democracy movement.
Public anger – fuelled by the aggressive tactics used by the police against demonstrators – has collided with years of frustration over worsening inequality and the cost of living in one of the world's most expensive, densely populated cities.
The protest movement was given fresh impetus on 21 July when gangs of men attacked protesters and commuters at a mass transit station – while authorities seemingly did little to intervene.
Underlying the movement is a push for full democracy in the city, whose leader is chosen by a committee dominated by a pro-Beijing establishment rather than by direct elections.
Protesters have vowed to keep their movement going until their core demands are met, such as the resignation of the city’s leader, Carrie Lam, an independent inquiry into police tactics, an amnesty for those arrested and a permanent withdrawal of the bill.
Lam announced on 4 September that she was withdrawing the bill.
Why were people so angry about the extradition bill?
Beijing’s influence over Hong Kong has grown in recent years, as activists have been jailed and pro-democracy lawmakers disqualified from running or holding office. Independent booksellers have disappeared from the city, before reappearing in mainland China facing charges.
Under the terms of the agreement by which the former British colony was returned to Chinese control in 1997, the semi-autonomous region was meant to maintain a “high degree of autonomy” through an independent judiciary, a free press and an open market economy, a framework known as “one country, two systems”.
The extradition bill was seen as an attempt to undermine this and to give Beijing the ability to try pro-democracy activists under the judicial system of the mainland.
How have the authorities responded?
Beijing has issued increasingly shrill condemnations but has left it to the city's semi-autonomous government to deal with the situation. Meanwhile police have violently clashed directly with protesters, repeatedly firing teargas and rubber bullets.
Beijing has ramped up its accusations that foreign countries are “fanning the fire” of unrest in the city. China’s top diplomat Yang Jiechi has ordered the US to “immediately stop interfering in Hong Kong affairs in any form”.
Lily Kuo and Guardian reporter in Hong Kong
On Monday, a statement allegedly from the victim’s sister circulating on an online forum said she had spent the night in intensive care receiving emergency surgery to reconstruct her eye, which was ruptured. The bones around her eye socket were also shattered.
The statement described the victim as “a girl who loves Hong Kong, who wants to protect her home, defend human rights and fight for freedom”. The sister wrote: “I hope you’ll take this anger with you to the airport today.”
Thousands of protesters soon swarmed Hong Kong’s international airport, chanting: “An eye for an eye!” Many wore bloodied bandages over their right eyes or held their hands over their faces as a symbol of resistance. One of the world’s busiest travel hubs was forced to shut down for two days and protesters took out their anger on two men believed to be spies, tying them up and abusing them.
Today, her image is on posters, pamphlets and placards, with blood trickling down her cheek like the visage of a weeping Madonna.
The young woman who was shot by Hong Kong police in the eye with what appeared to be bean bag round quickly becoming the latest image of tremendous anger with police and their tactics. Calls for a mass rally at the airport this afternoon. pic.twitter.com/x4FjB6asFY
— Timothy McLaughlin (@TMclaughlin3) August 12, 2019
Richard Scotford, a journalist who was metres away from the victim at the time, said the shot was fired into a group of people on the street clearly comprised of journalists and first-aid volunteers in high-vis vests.
“This white thing was also what I saw whizz past my face just five minutes before the girl was shot,” he posted on his Facebook page, referring to an image of the “non-lethal” beanbag round found in her goggles.
For some protesters, the image of one of their own disfigured and partially blinded has fed calls for more radical measures, including the idea that Hong Kong should be brought to a point of chaos in order to be rebuilt.
“So many people have been hurt and bled, yet we still talk about reason, peace and non-violence,” one user wrote in response to the statement from the victim’s sister. “Dying together is what we need. Let’s take Hong Kong back to zero and those who truly love it will remain.”
Her case has also become a flashpoint for mistrust of the police and competing narratives by pro-Beijing media. China’s state-run broadcaster CCTV has alleged the woman was not shot with a police beanbag round but a ball bearing fired by a fellow protester.
The police admitted to using beanbag rounds but said they could not definitively say if she had been shot by an officer. They said they had started an investigation into the case, but a statement online allegedly from the woman’s friend called on protesters not to submit videos or evidence to law enforcement.