China, U.S. Standoff Deepens Over Hong Kong Protests

Updated Oct. 11, 2014 11:33 p.m. ET

Pro-Democracy Demonstrations Stretch Into a Third Week With No Compromise in Sight

A protester sleeps in a hammock on a highway blocked by pro-democracy protesters outside the government headquarters building in Hong Kong early Sunday. Reuters

SHANGHAI—As pro-democracy demonstrations in Hong Kong stretch into a third week with no sign either protesters or local authorities are ready to compromise, a rhetorical standoff is deepening between China and the U.S. over the protests.

China’s state-run media increasingly allege the Hong Kong protesters are being manipulated by the U.S., including in a Friday editorial in a Communist Party mouthpiece. It came a day after a commission of U.S. lawmakers and Obama administration officials published a report titled “Increase support for Hong Kong’s democracy.”

On Sunday, Hong Kong’s chief executive, Leung Chun-ying, said in a televised interview that the protest is an “out of control mass movement,” but not a revolution. He said none of the leaders of the three major organizing groups—Scholarism, Hong Kong Federation of Students and Occupy Central With Love and Peace—can dictate the direction or pace of the movement now.

Mr. Leung said he doesn’t intend to resign as protesters had demanded, saying his stepping down won’t help to resolve the standoff and that the their demand that Beijing retract its decision on screening candidates for the 2017 chief executive elections is impossible. He said the police decision to use tear gas on the crowds on Sept. 28, which sparked outrage among many in the city, was the “professional judgment” of the police without any political considerations.

Mr. Leung also said his deal with Australian engineering company UGL Ltd. is just a standard “noncompete, nonpoach” agreement and said there is no conflict of interest with his public duty. News last week of his agreement to a £4 million ($6.4 million) payment as part of a noncompete deal with UGL several months before he took office appeared to give his detractors ammunition.

“Hacktivist” group Anonymous claimed in the early hours Sunday to have hacked around 50,000 Chinese government emails and to have brought down a number of government websites by targeted denial-of-service attacks. Alleged usernames and passwords of nearly 50,000 email accounts were posted to the group’s account on the code depot Pastebin. Anonymous also claimed to have brought down at least 16 government websites, but most of them were back up by Sunday morning. The authenticity of the hacked email addresses couldn’t be independently verified.

Cybersecurity firm Volexity, meanwhile, published a report over the weekend saying that it had found malicious code embedded on the websites of multiple Hong Kong pro-democracy groups.

Key Hong Kong streets remained blocked Sunday. The number of protesters had increased Saturday evening, though crowds appeared smaller than on Friday night, when several thousand came out to dispel talk the protests had lost momentum.

Carrie Lam, Hong Kong’s No. 2 official, on Thursday canceled planned talks between the Hong Kong government and student protest leaders a day before they were supposed to take place. She and other top Hong Kong officials left the city for weekend meetings in southern China. Even among supporters of the protests in Hong Kong, tensions continue to mount over serious disruptions to city traffic and commerce.

After a call by student leader Joshua Wong, hundreds of tents had been erected at the main protest site.

Rising rhetoric from Beijing and Washington about the protests, meanwhile, illustrates Hong Kong’s unique position. Multiple guardians claim an interest in the former British colony that reverted to Chinese rule 17 years ago, and which remains a strategic gateway between East and West.

Demonstrators gather near tents outside the Central Government Offices in the Admiralty business district of Hong Kong, China, on Saturday. Bloomberg News

China’s government, which allows Hong Kong to maintain freedoms not permitted in the mainland, has bluntly told the international community that Hong Kong affairs are a domestic matter with no room for foreign input.

The U.S. doesn’t dispute China’s sovereignty but says it supports democratic elections under Hong Kong’s Basic Law, or mini-constitution, that guarantees the territory’s semiautonomy until 2047. The U.S. government claims the right to a voice because of its interests in Hong Kong, including numerous businesses that depend on its well-regarded institutions like its legal system.

In the report Thursday from the Congressional-Executive Commission on China, U.S. lawmakers and administration officials called on Washington to become more vocal on Hong Kong, describing local democracy aspirations as an increasingly important human-rights issue. “Members of Congress and the Administration should increase support for Hong Kong’s democracy through statements and meetings at the highest levels and visits to Hong Kong,” the report said.

Hong Kong Protests

A spokesman for China’s Foreign Affairs Ministry, Hong Lei, on Friday called the report a distortion of facts that could damage China-U.S. relations.

Beijing through its state-controlled media claims that the U.S. is already manipulating the situation in Hong Kong to achieve aims that are anti-China.

Accusing Westerners and the U.S. in particular of inciting domestic rebellion against Beijing’s one-party state has been a recurring theme in China’s propaganda for nearly a decade. China-backed Hong Kong media have accused Mr. Wong, the student leader, of being supported by the U.S., citing frequent meetings with U.S. diplomats and donations from Americans; Mr. Wong has denied the assertions.

On Friday, a Chinese Communist Party organ published a catalog of accusations that it said prove the U.S. is encouraging the protests. The commentary likened efforts from Americans to the so-called “color revolutions” that in earlier years ousted governments from Ukraine to Algeria.

“It is hardly likely that the U.S. will admit to manipulating the [protest] movement, just as it will not admit to manipulating other anti-China forces. It sees such activities as justified by ‘democracy,’ ‘freedom,’ ‘human rights’ and other values,” said the editorial. It appeared in the People’s Daily overseas editions, but not the domestic newspaper which is seen as the voice of the top leadership.

At home, Chinese media each day feature news from Hong Kong but avoid images of the demonstrations themselves, and instead focus on collateral impact such as snarled traffic, empty shops and experts who highlight risks to Hong Kong’s reputation as an international finance center.

As proof of U.S. backing for protests, the editorial cited alleged activity by a senior official of the National Endowment for Democracy, a foundation funded by the U.S. Congress, including meetings held with protest organizers months ago.

The official, Louisa Greve, couldn’t immediately be reached. On social media, Ms. Greve has appeared to support Hong Kong’s student protesters. Her most recent post to Twitter on Oct. 4 makes reference to the United Nations’ International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which Hong Kong is a party under prehandover agreements and which sets out requirements for fair and democratic elections.

For years, China’s government has tracked the activities and donations of U.S. groups like the National Endowment for Democracy. A task force of mainland scholars was set up five years ago to study “the activities of U.S. [nongovernmental organizations] in Hong Kong and their impact on Hong Kong’s politics and policies,” according to an outline of the project’s works.

Friday’s editorial also took issue with a recent statement signed by three former U.S. consuls-general who served in Hong Kong that criticized the election proposal from Beijing.

And the People’s Daily editorial questioned the motives for “exceptional interest” in the movement by U.S. media, making reference to coverage including an editorial that appeared Sept. 28 in The Wall Street Journal headlined “Hong Kong’s Democratic Awakening.”

The People’s Daily editorial concluded by saying: “The U.S. may enjoy the sweet taste of interfering in other countries’ internal affairs, but on the issue of Hong Kong it stands little chance of overcoming the determination of the Chinese government to maintain stability and prosperity.”

The two main student groups leading the protests, the Hong Kong Federation of Students and Scholarism, late Saturday issued an open letter to Chinese President Xi Jinping that appeared to be in response to the allegations of foreign support in the People’s Daily editorial. It said the protest movement “isn’t a ‘color revolution,’ it’s a movement by Hong Kong people in pursuit of democracy.”

The open letter added that free elections won’t mean taking power from the central government, pointing out that Hong Kong defense and diplomacy issues remain in the hands of Beijing.

—Jacky Wong and Gregor Stuart Hunter in Hong Kong and Charles Hutzler in Beijing contributed to this article.

China'Watch'Canada

Saturday, October 11, 2014