Possibly hundreds of thousands of people in Hong Kong were packed in the city's streets opposing the new security law and demanding democracy.
It was impossible to measure the size of the crowd that were dwelling for several hours in the downtown area, but the estimates were between 200,000 and 500,000. The protest were the biggest since 1989 when Hong Kong's people supported students who got massacred on Tiananmen square in Beijing.
The target for the big protest was the new security law, which is likely to be passed on July 9th.
The law forbids demagogy and other activities against the government, so called "subversion". It enables life sentences and secret trials for dissidents, and extends the power of police to engage in house searches.
According to opponents the law threatens the freedom of speech, belief, press and assembly. With the help of this law, the central government of China can reinforce its grip on Hong Kong and it can weed out what it considers to be unpleasant elements.
When Hong Kong was transferred from Britain to China in 1997, the "one country, two systems" policy of the constitution of HKSAR ensured that China will respect the rule of law in Hong Kong for at least 50 years. However, Article 23 of the SAR constitution demands Hong Kong to block "subversive" activities.
"We believe that the real target for the government is groups like that of Falun Gong and dissidents", Sophie Xiao, spokesperson for Hong Kong's Falun Gong said. Over 300 members of the spiritual movement were gathered in Victoria Park before the start of the march. "We are going to continue with our daily exercises and peaceful appeals after the law has come into force," Sophie stated.
"The law isn't clear enough", Dona Mek, 26, volunteer worker of the NGO Civil Human Rights Front said. "Most frightening is that it doesn't clearly differentiate between which kind of cases can put us to jail...everything is possible."
People were especially angry about the way that the security law has been rushed through in a haste.
http://www.helsinginsanomat.fi/uutiset/artikkeli/1056721044134
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