Hong Kong leader CY Leung reopens offer of talks with protesters, hopes to schedule for next week
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Photo: Anti-government stickers on a road sign in central Hong Kong during protests. (ABC News: Sarah Clarke)
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Hong Kong's chief executive CY Leung has sought to defuse tension with pro-democracy protesters by reopening the offer of talks next week.
The territory's leader addressed the press after more than two weeks of protests that have paralysed parts of the city amid scenes of violent clashes.
Chief secretary Carrie Lam cancelled talks with student leaders earlier this month, saying it was impossible to have constructive dialogue.
Mr Leung has said there is "zero chance" Beijing will give in to protesters' demands for the democratic election of the chief executive in 2017, a view shared by most political analysts and many Hong Kong citizens.
"We don't find civil nomination in all Western democracies either," Mr Leung said, when a reporter challenged him on how the talks could progress when he was ruling out any changes to the electoral framework.
Beijing insists on screening candidates first, and Mr Leung has reiterated that the government was unwilling to compromise.
Mr Leung spoke as posters depicting him as a fanged wolf, a gang boss and Hitler stared down from the walls of government headquarters and the Legislative Council building in Admiralty, the epicentre of the protest movement against him.
In the early hours of Thursday, police used pepper spray to stop protesters from blocking a major road near the chief executive's office amid public anger over a police beating and kicking, captured on video, of a protester a day earlier.
Beating breathes new life into flagging protests
Authorities said the officer involved in the beating of Ken Tsang, a member of the pro-democracy Civic Party, would be suspended.
Footage of the beating has gone viral and injected fresh momentum into the protest that had been flagging after nearly three weeks of demonstrations.
Mr Tsang was taken to hospital and activists released photographs showing bruising on his face and body.
"I think the police have betrayed us Hong Kong citizens," said Tony Yip, 23, a research assistant at a science museum.
"They are using violence against ordinary citizens."
On Wednesday, Hong Kong's most prominent property tycoon, Li Ka-shing, urged the protesters to go home.
Mr Li, Asia's richest man, had made no public comment on the protests but broke his silence and said, if Hong Kong's rule of law broke down it would be the city's "greatest sorrow".
"I urge everyone not to be agitated," he said.
"I urge everyone not to let today's passion become the regret for tomorrow. I earnestly request everyone to return to their families."
Is Hong Kong heading for a Tiananmen confrontation? The context is far different to 1989, writes Hamish McDonald.
A few hundred protesters were camped out around the main protest site in Admiralty on Thursday, with the atmosphere calm.
At its peak, 100,000 protesters had been on the streets, presenting Beijing with one of its biggest political challenges since it crushed pro-democracy demonstrations in and around Tiananmen Square in the Chinese capital in 1989.
China rules Hong Kong under a "one country, two systems" formula that gives the city wide-ranging autonomy and freedoms not enjoyed in mainland China, with universal suffrage an eventual goal.
But Communist Party rulers, fearful that demands for democracy might spread to the mainland, say only candidates vetted by a nominating committee will be able to contest a full city-wide vote to choose the next chief executive in 2017.
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