Timeline of the 2019–2020 Hong Kong protests (July 2019)
July events of the 2019–2020 pro-democracy demonstrations in Hong Kong / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This segment of the timeline of the 2019–2020 Hong Kong protests covers the month of July 2019. The anniversary of the 1997 handover of Hong Kong to China on 1 July saw large daytime protests. In the evening of that day, protesters stormed the Legislative Council Building and defaced symbols, with police only moving in after midnight. This incident, which was sharply condemned by the government of Carrie Lam, did however not lead to a split between peaceful and violent protesters. Observers linked the understanding of the non-violent protesters for the violent wing to the lack of willingness of the Lam government to engage in dialogue about the protesters' five demands. Apart from major protests on Sundays, there were also mostly peaceful demonstrations during the week.
A pattern became established such that peaceful daytime protests were followed by violent clashes between protesters and police at night. Police continued to draw criticism for its heavy-handed tactics.
A further landmark event in the evolution of the protests was the Yuen Long attack on 21 July. White-shirted gangs descended on Yuen Long station and wrought havoc in chaotic scenes, with a vast number of calls of citizens to police being unanswered until the attackers had retreated. This led to a further loss of faith of protesters and their sympathisers in the integrity of the police force, and also further worsened their views of the Hong Kong government. The government and representatives of the force would change their framing of the attack several times over the course of the following year.[1]