In the afternoon of the 1st of July, fifth anniversary or the handover of Hong Kong to China, half a million demonstrators held a mass rally against the implementation of the Article 23 of the Basic Law that the HK Government was trying to force through the legislature. In the evening of the same day, the People's Daily wrote:
Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Wednesday, July 09, 2003

Nitty-gritty of Demonstration Freedom in Hong Kong

July 1, 2003 marks the sixth anniversary of Hong Kong's return to the motherland. On that day some people sang and danced in celebration of the anniversary, while others held a demonstration in streets. Such a contrast presents vividly the diversification of the Hong Kong society on one hand, but on the other, it shows clearly that Hong Kong remains still a place full of freedom and democracy. Practices in the past six years have irrefutably testified to this fact.
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The following picture shows the first group of people (in the almost empty three soccer fields rented by the pro-Beijing party called DAB, delimited by a red border) and the second group (all around, part of the demonstrators). Oh, by the way: the DAB had also offered free food and drinks :-)


(Source: The HK Economic Times, 2nd of July 2003, page A6)

One week later, the approval was postponed sine die after the resignation from the Executive Council (i.e., the cabinet) of James Tien, leader of the Liberal Party, who decided to withdraw his party's support to that law. Nevertheless, 50,000 demonstrators in the evening surrounded the Legislative Council asking for the resignations of the Chief Excutive Tung Chee-hwa and the unpopular Secretary for Security Regina Ip. Some pro-Beijing legislators were not pleased: here the National People's Congress delegate Philip Wong Yu-hong (close to the DAB) shows his respect for the electorate by giving the demonstrators the finger (he later apologized, saying that the demonstrators fingered him first :-) ):

(Source: The HK Economic Times, 10th of July 2003, page A4)

To be continued...