Hong Kong (AFP)

It is a move considered as an escalation in Hong Kong: the police used water cannons against radical protesters on Sunday, a first in the former British colony shaken by pro-democracy protests.

The semi-autonomous territory, one of the world's major financial centers, has been experiencing its worst political crisis since June since its return to China in 1997.

Born out of opposition to a now suspended bill to allow extradition to mainland China, the movement has turned into a more global campaign for more democracy and protection of local liberties from Beijing.

Thousands of Hong Kongers still paraded quietly in the pouring rain on Sunday in the Tsuen Wan area. But radical protesters then erected a barricade and threw cobblestones and Molotov cocktails at the police.

After firing tear gas that did not have the desired effect, the riot police used water cannons against the protesters.

A sign of escalation, law enforcement has so far always claimed to want to use this technique of dispersion in case of "large-scale disruption of public order".

Current in the West, water cannons are a novelty in Hong Kong where they had not been used against protesters so far. The population is therefore very sensitive to their use.

- Closed Metro -

Since the beginning of the movement, the reaction of the central government has been mixed.

While it has no legal right to intervene directly in Hong Kong, Beijing has used a range of methods, from intimidation to propaganda and economic pressure, to try to contain the opposition. .

The MTR - the Hong Kong subway - is currently facing public criticism, after apparently giving in to Chinese official media criticism of the transportation network for being in the service of protesters' movements.

On Sunday, the transport network closed some Tsuen Wan neighborhood stations near the site of the main protest for the second day in a row.

A second gathering of several hundred people, in which police relatives were involved, was also held at another location in the city on Sunday afternoon.

A woman claiming to be the wife of a police officer had come to declare her support to the police, believing that they had received enough criticism.

- 'Covered with opprobrium' -

"I believe that during these two months, the police have been sufficiently disgraced," she said.

"I really want you to know that even if the whole world spits on you, we, family members, we will not do it."

The police of the territory, regularly blasted by the demonstrators, has been in the center for weeks of the ire of the protestors who accuse him of violence.

The police on Saturday charged radical pro-democracy protesters who had erected a barricade in eastern Hong Kong. Scuffles that marked the end of a relative lull of 10 days in the former British colony.

Police fired tear gas and beat protesters who threw stones and bottles.

Ten people were hospitalized as a result of the clashes, including two in serious condition, told AFP medical staff, without specifying whether they are police or demonstrators.

© 2019 AFP