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Clashes Erupt as Hong Kong Police Crack Down on Protesters

Thousands of pro-democracy activists clashed with police early on Saturday in a bid to reclaim one of the most volatile protest sites.
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HONG KONG — Thousands of pro-democracy activists clashed with police in running scuffles in the gritty district of Mong Kok early on Saturday in a bid to reclaim part of one of the largest and most volatile protest sites in Hong Kong.

After hours of tense face-offs, with police showing relative restraint at first, hundreds of riot police baton-charged the crowds with shields, pepper spraying and wrestling a string of protesters to the ground in chaotic scenes.

Several bands comprised of hundreds of protesters, some of whom pelted police with eggs and bottled water, retreated but regrouped swiftly in other spots, stoked on rather than cowed by the clampdown.

Many rushed to lay fresh barricades across roads amid a wail of sirens and loud chants for "real full democracy."

The fresh tensions will be a set-back for authorities who have struggled for months to find a resolution to the most serious governance crisis to be faced in the former British colony since it returned to Chinese rule in 1997.

The protests have simmered for three consecutive nights in Mong Kok since police staged a swift and surprisingly smooth clearance of the area's protest encampment on Wednesday, arresting more than a hundred people including key student leaders Joshua Wong and Lester Shum.

Friday marks two months since police first fired tear gas to disperse demonstrators from the main protest site in the Admiralty district next to government offices in the heart of the Asian financial center.

Lined with jewelry and electronics shops, and grimy tenement blocks, bustling Mong Kok has been a key battleground for protesters and mobs intent on disbanding them.

The protesters, mostly students, are demanding full democracy. They have called on the city's embattled leader, Leung Chun-ying, to step down after Beijing in August ruled out free elections for Hong Kong's next leader in 2017, despite constitutional promises made by China to allow eventual universal suffrage in the city of 7.3 million.

In one tense skirmish early on Saturday morning, around a hundred activists trapped four traffic policeman, one bleeding in the face, demanding they release an activist they'd pinned to the ground. The police lashed out with batons to keep back the crowds for around 10 minutes until re-enforcements arrived.

Image: Pro-democracy protesters fall on the ground as they are chased by riot police at Mong Kok shopping district in Hong Kong
Pro-democracy protesters fall on the ground as they are chased by riot police at Mong Kok shopping district in Hong Kong early on Nov. 29. Police are clearing one of the largest protest sites that have choked the city for weeks. The streets of Mong Kok have been a key battleground for protesters and mobs intent on disbanding them, and was viewed as the protest site most likely to resist clearance.TYRONE SIU / Reuters

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— Reuters