Border drills a ‘clear warning’ to HK
Troops, APCs seen in Shenzhen stadium
SHENZHEN: Hundreds of members of China’s People’s Armed Police could be seen conducting exercises yesterday at a sports stadium in Shenzhen, as the US State Department expressed concern that they could be deployed across the border in Hong Kong to break up protests wracking the city.
Meanwhile, President Donald Trump made what seemed to be an overture to the Chinese leader Xi Jinping in a series of tweets that linked the protests in Hong Kong to the continuing trade conflict between the US and China.
Mr Trump praised Mr Xi as “a great leader” who wants to “quickly and humanely solve the Hong Kong problem”. The president ended that post with “Personal meeting?” without clarifying whether he was suggesting a summit with Mr Xi.
In a tweet sent shortly before that, Mr Trump wrote that “of course China wants to make a trade deal. Let them work humanely with Hong Kong first!”
He also said that his decision to hold off on imposing new tariffs on China until December “actually helps China more than us, but will be reciprocated. Millions of jobs are being lost in China to other non-Tariffed countries.”
The White House had no immediate comment on the tweets, which were posted hours after US equities plunged as a Treasury yield curve inverted, heightening fears of a recession. The trade dispute with China has contributed to the rising anxiety, which arrived at a difficult time for Mr Trump, who has based his re-election strategy on a robust economy.
Attempting to carry out diplomacy over social media, however, carries risks.
Even suggesting a link between the trade dispute and the Hong Kong unrest will feed suspicions in Beijing that the US is seeking to leverage China’s domestic crisis as part of broader strategy to check its rise. China has in recent weeks attempted to paint the US as a “black hand” behind the protests, with a front-page commentary in the Communist Party’s People’s Daily newspaper saying yesterday that the goal of such forces was fomenting a “color revolution”.
Earlier on Wednesday, Mr Trump tried to deflect criticism of his trade agenda by lashing out at Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell, and blamed his policies for the bad news in the markets.
He repeated his criticism that the US is being harmed by the Fed not lowering interest rates quickly enough relative to other countries.
Amid the chaos, Western and Asian diplomats in Hong Kong said Beijing has little appetite for rolling the PAP or the People’s Liberation Army onto Hong Kong’s streets.
Yesterday, men in fatigues could be seen in a stadium and shouts and whistles could be heard by a Reuters journalist. The stadium is next to a retail complex and shoppers were milling around the area, although the entrances to the stadium were closed.
Parking spaces at the stadium were filled with more than 100 dark-painted paramilitary vehicles, including troop trucks, armoured personnel carriers, buses and jeeps. At least three were armoured wheel-loaders, and two vehicles carried water cannons.
“This is the first time I’ve seen such a large-scale meeting,” said Yang Ying, a receptionist at a wellness centre inside the stadium’s retail complex.
“There have been exercises in the past, but usually they involve traffic police,” she added. “Our friends, social media all say it’s because of Hong Kong.”
Ten weeks of increasingly violent confrontations between police and protesters have plunged Hong Kong into its worst crisis since it reverted from British to Chinese rule in 1997.
On Wednesday the US State Department said it was deeply concerned about reports that Chinese police forces were gathering near the border with Hong Kong and urged the city’s government to respect freedom of speech.
Troops marched in and out of the Shenzhen stadium, some in fatigues, some in black T-shirts and camouflage trousers. The floor of an indoor area visible through an open gate was lined with mats and rucksacks.
Chinese state media have made several mentions of exercises in Shenzhen.
The Global Times, a tabloid run by the ruling Communist Party, published a video early this week showing columns of trucks and armoured personnel carriers rolling through the city.
The paper said the vehicles belonged to the People’s Armed Police and had gathered for “apparent-large scale exercises”. Its editor, Hu Xijin, described it on Twitter as “a clear warning to rioters in Hong Kong”.