Most extreme Hong Kong protesters are undermining the cause of democracy

The Hong Kong protests have been going on for more than five months and have generally attracted sympathetic and supportive headlines in the West. The protestors started their campaign because they opposed new legislation which would have allowed residents of Hong Kong accused of crimes to be sent to China for trial. After weeks of protests and demonstrations and massed gatherings in the streets, the Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam announced that she would suspend the planned legislation and eventually dropped it altogether. But by then the fire in the belly of the protesters had reached red-hot level and the demos continued, this time in the name of democracy. The protests became a rallying cry for help against China and the spectre of Tiananmen Square was raised, with the suggestion that Beijing would send in the army to quell the protests, just as it did in the Chinese capital in 1989 when troops opened fire on protesters with tanks and rifles, killing hundreds, and maybe thousands. Again their fears attracted supportive headlines although wise commentators dismissed the idea that Beijing would make the same mistake and send in the army. Now the Hong Kong violence has reached a new level and I believe sympathy for the remaining protesters holed up in the polytechnic university complex in Kowloon will vanish. The scenes of violent action have been horrific, with protesters launching arrows that burst into flame on impact, catapulting rocks and bricks and throwing petrol bombs. This is anarchy not a fight for democracy. The most extreme protesters are destroying what was a justified and acceptable cause. And to make it worse, they have called on youngsters to join them, and children did just that and became embroiled in what will always be the most frightening experience of their lives. The Hong Kong police have used extreme violence too with water cannon, rubber bullets and even on at least two occasions, live rounds, the most notorious occasion being when a police officer fired a live round into the chest of a protester standing just feet away. Excessive measures such as these have provoked more and more violence by the protesters. If there is to be any solution to this appalling breakdown in law and order in what used to be Britain's most flourishing colony, the violence has to stop, on both sides. Jeremy Hunt, the former UK foreign secretary, suggested last night on BBC Newsnight that some of the most extreme protesters were deliberately trying to provoke Beijing into launching another Tiananmen Square. I think he may be right. Using extreme violence to further the cause of democracy is wrong. My lasting impression of the hate and fear on the streets of Hong Kong will not be the masked faces of those firing their deadly arrows at the police but the petrified faces of the kids coming out from the hell-hole university campus and having their "data" taken down by the authorities before being allowed home.