
UPDATE: As of 10:45 a.m. ET time (11:45 p.m. local time), Hong Kong protesters are made their way into the legislative Council chamber. According to CNN, they have been spraying slogans in Chinese on the wall behind the President’s chair. One protester attempted to hang the British colonial-era flag over the city’s crest.
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CNN senior diplomatic editor Nic Robertson has found himself at the front line of a protest today. Literally.
Robertson is covering the Hong Kong government protests over the controversial China extradition bill that would send some criminals to China for trial. Protesters see that as going against their fundamental freedoms.
The protests came to a head today, taking a drastic turn when, after weeks of mass demonstrations, hundreds of Hong Kong protesters stormed the government headquarters, smashing glass while trying to break in.
Robertson called the building “the equivalent of the White House in the United States.”
The protesters skew young, and they’re definitely angry; and the reason they were putting umbrellas in front of Robertson’s face was so that the police couldn’t see what’s going on. They don’t want their faces seen on camera so the police could potentially track them down.
Take a look:
“We are literally at the frontline of this protest.”
Hong Kong protesters are “systematically” breaking through the windows of the regions’ Legislative Council building. Follow live updates here: https://t.co/VPAC08pGYu pic.twitter.com/TZoM9VKBya
— CNN (@CNN) July 1, 2019