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Pro-Beijing leader Carrie Lam has denied being willing to resign after the leak of audio recordings seemingly evoke the opposite. REUTERS / Tyrone Siu

Carrie Lam, the head of the Hong Kong executive, who focuses the anger of the pro-democracy movement, said Tuesday, September 3, have no intention to resign, after the leak of an audio recording in which she says she wants to leave her post.

With our special correspondent in Hong Kong , Stéphane Lagarde

The recording that Reuters obtained is nothing but a whisper - since it was not supposed to come out of camera - what sinologists have said aloud for several weeks. The fact that the Chinese regime has considered since its inception last June, the movement against the extradition law as a risk to national security has blocked any possibility of negotiations with the opponents.

Excuses

The head of the executive apologizes for the political impasse in the special administrative region. " To have caused this immense devastation in Hong Kong, for a chief executive is unforgivable ... It's just unforgivable. If I had the choice, the first thing I will do is resign . "

At this private meeting, the Hong Kong government official said she could no longer leave her home to go to the mall or the hairdressing salon. " My travels would spread immediately on social networks ," she says. And a crowd of t-shirts and black masks would be there waiting for me. A frustrated personal life, a degraded political image, but today Carrie Lam says that her remarks have probably been distorted.

She never offered to resign. " From the beginning until now, I have never, ever given my resignation to the People's Central Government. I did not even consider discussing a resignation with the central government. The choice not to resign is my own choice. "

Sabotage?

This version is obviously much more in line with the "one country, two systems" model that gives decision-making autonomy to the Hong Kong government. It is also more suitable for the official version.

The editorialist of the Chinese state newspaper Global Times has taken care to defuse the Reuters bomb on Monday, condemning " stories that sabotage relations between the government of the special administrative region and Beijing ."