Occupy Central
Occupy Central is a civil disobedience movement which began in Hong Kong on September 28, 2014. It calls on thousands of protesters to block roads and paralyse Hong Kong's financial district if the Beijing and Hong Kong governments do not agree to implement universal suffrage for the chief executive election in 2017 and the Legislative Council elections in 2020 according to "international standards." The movement was initiated by Benny Tai Yiu-ting (戴耀廷), an associate professor of law at the University of Hong Kong, in January 2013.
Umbrella Movement
The Umbrella Movement (Chinese: 雨傘運動; pinyin: yǔsǎn yùndòng) is a loose political movement that was created spontaneously during the Hong Kong protests of 2014. Its name derives from the recognition of the umbrella as a symbol of defiance and resistance against the Hong Kong government, and the united grass-roots objection to the decision of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPCSC) of 31 August.
The movement consists of individuals numbering in the tens of thousands who participated in the protests that began on 28 September 2014, although Scholarism, the Hong Kong Federation of Students, Occupy Central with Love and Peace, groups are principally driving the demands for the rescission of the NPCSC decision.
The movement consists of individuals numbering in the tens of thousands who participated in the protests that began on 28 September 2014, although Scholarism, the Hong Kong Federation of Students, Occupy Central with Love and Peace, groups are principally driving the demands for the rescission of the NPCSC decision.
POST OCCUPY CENTRAL - DAY 165:
Full coverage of the day’s events on 30-05
Shenzhen crunch meeting no mere show
The Legislative Council's vote on the political reform package will be held in less than a month.
It came as a bit of a surprise when Beijing invited all lawmakers to Shenzhen for a meeting on Sunday.
This is probably the last critical moment prior to the expected June 17 vote.
Will the meeting be little more than a show, as feared by some, or will it be the opportunity that people anxious to see improvement to local governance have been waiting for?
Like many, I'm anxiously watching the developments too.
Some pan-democrats say they'll be traveling to Shenzhen, while others say they won't.
Democratic Party chief Emily Lau Wai-hing isn't - sticking by her pledge not to go to the mainland on one-off invitations when she has not been issued a permit to freely travel there.
But Lau added the party will have three members at a meeting attended by Hong Kong and Macao Affairs Office director Wang Guangya, Basic Law Committee chief Li Fei and central government liaison office director Zhang Xiaoming.
The Labour Party's Lee Cheuk-yan isn't going as the pre-June 4 march set for the same day is more important to him.
That's true. The June 4 candlelight vigil has become a signature event that tens of thousands of Hongkongers would never miss. The march on Sunday is a prelude to the 26th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre.
But I question whether the schedule is really that unmanageable for Lee. If his pan-democratic peer, Frederick Fung Kin-kee, is able to attend the morning meeting and be back in time for the march in the afternoon, why can't Lee?
It seems more like a feeble excuse.
But what really matters is whether this last-minute gathering will be useful or not. If both Beijing and the pan- democrats are going into the meeting with the intention of blaming each other for failing to pass the reform plan, it would then be an exercise in futility.
They should know by now that the public is fed up.
If the meeting is more than a show aimed at passing the blame, I'm sure everybody will be eager to see concrete steps taken to break the deadlock, which, if unresolved, will keep impacting on governance and haunt the future of Hong Kong.
So, what's to be expected of the meeting? It's really difficult to say although making the nominating committee more broadly based and issuing a post-dated check to undertake to make improvements to the electoral system after 2017 would certainly help boost the chances of passage.
Then again, only recently did Basic Law Committee deputy director Zhang Rongshun categorically reject the idea of broadening the base of the nominating committee.
It's increasingly like a card game in which players try their best to intimidate each other in the hope of scoring the most points against each other.
But the stakes rise if both sides refuse to be intimidated.
When the table is cleared, they may discover there is no winner. Will it be too late by then?
