Hong Kong: Hundreds of protesters besieged by police in Hong Kong's Polytechnic University for more than 12 hours remained holed up in the campus on Monday, after an extremely volatile day hitherto unseen in the anti-government protest movement that has been roiling the Asian financial hub for over five months.
Following a tense night in which many Hongkongers watched events unfold on live streams with apprehension, the fate of the anti-government activists stranded in PolyU in the harbour-side district of Hung Hom remains in limbo, reports Efe news.
Police officers who have been surrounding the campus since Sunday evening ban anyone from entering, and anyone walking out of the campus, except journalists with valid press passes, will be arrested.
At noon on Monday, the police repeated their message of the previous night, calling on all "rioters" inside the campus to surrender and come out "peacefully".
At around the same time, Hong Kong's Chief Executive Carrie Lam went to a hospital to visit a police officer whose leg was hit by an arrow during a skirmish on Sunday.
She is yet to make any comment on the siege. According to Owan Li, a student representative on PolyU's university council, at least three stranded activists have sustained eye injuries and 40 suffer from hypothermia after being hit by police water cannons on Sunday night.
Activists have also complained of a lack of medical attention, saying police arrested most paramedics who walked out of PolyU.
At a press conference on Sunda, PolyU's student union president Derek Liu said: "We extremely regret that police undertook the arrest operation. We absolutely do not wish to see another June 4 [Tiananmen crackdown] taking place in Hong Kong, or even at PolyU, our second home."
