the people of east germany. the music tent the crowd clamors for german unity journalist on the board who was at the scene. 30 years later looks back on the time interest in. a strange december 19th g.w. . last sunday's election in hong kong may have been strictly local but it sent a signal straight to the heart of made lunch china in the face of an increasingly violent standoff between 12 democracy protesters and hong kong's beijing backed government a record number of voters turned out for the poll and handed a landslide victory to pro-democracy candidates for the city's local district councils the resulting defeat took on kong's be legal government by surprise and up the pressure on breaching will that make a crackdown on the protesters more difficult or more likely hongkong elections wake

up call for b.j. that's our top. good. luck. welcome to to the point we've invited 3 highly knowledgeable guests to exchange views on what the hong kong election result could mean hunch when lead born in hong kong works for 5 years at deutsche of ella as a t.v. reporter and also on our china desk and she says what happens in hong kong should be a wake up call for the whole world the chinese regime is a danger to all free societies. is an expert with germany's renowned battles money foundation and he says beijing's reaction to pressure is counter pressure not only hong kong will feel it but also the west.

and it's a pleasure to welcome glacier fong she is a hong kong native digital rights and political activist she's currently studying in homburg germany position the opposition might have won the election but not yet the fight for human rights the system is broken the fight can't stop here and it can start now. so let me start out by asking the 2 of you huntsman and also glacier what you are hearing from friends and family at home what's their reaction to the election result they were very surprised because it was landslide victory and they didn't expect that they expect the democrats will win little power but not that much so they were very happy and also expressed a lot of you know that they express their views on online for example my friends well. most of the protests many of the protestors are actually still under 18 and they still convo and if they could have the results could have been like even it

could have been a more even bigger victory for the democrats so that sounds like a pretty upbeat reaction how about in the case of your friends and family glacier what are they saying my friends are actually very surprised about well they're a little bit more pessimistic they were saying that oh now we have won to district council so now what do we do up next and what everybody just things because we have one to district council election that means the movement is over many friends are kind of worried about that people would have. a person in that because we won that district council and that's it for them and we have achieved everything one but it's actually not the case so war less they're a bit pessimistic but they're still very happy about actually at least with show the world most of the majority are in support of the pen democratic party and you yourself clearly have an opinion you say the protests can and should go on i'm not saying that the protests have to go on like definite. but we have to continue to

fight for our basic fit him in right for example the right to run for office to write to felt for our leaders in our government i think this is what i mean by the protests should go on we cannot stop here because even though we won and the system but the system itself is already problematic and broken so we need to fix that before we can go any further in that so they're not it sounds to me if i put that statement together with your own opening statement that beijing will sustain or even increase the pressure as if we're not likely to see any real climb down from the stand down of the past but it's i'm afraid that's what's going to happen i think this is actually much more than a wake up call because the bills have been ringing for 6 months so this is more the ice bucket that you get if you really really don't get out of bed the question is does beijing understand that the path that they followed for the last 6 months just hasn't worked and that they've totally underestimated. the resolve of the hong kong

people and that they've kind of belief too much their own propaganda because as far as i know beijing has been taken totally by surprise by this by this result let's listen to what some of the protesters had to say after the election results to get a few more impressions about what people are saying in hong kong. some would believe that we have won the election the people have won but i don't think this is what we really want to ultimately one who is. to get lost or been forced and the law enforcers should be we doing that job but didn't just standing on the opposite side of the people i mean is this stuff and everything to be honest like. for the social life of the protester. if it goes well and you don't just bottle part of well i think the protests will just go down like his saudi otherwise you're

just going to go off base all depends on how to cause i'm going to provide. it's already the de facto referendum to approve. a free election when more than 70 almost 80 percent of people vote in action. why can't people get back to rights that our government we are not satisfy only elected that this or consulate's. so as we heard there much is riding on what the hong kong government does next let's hear what the leader the embattled kerry lamb had to say following the election we have for fisherman formally withdrawn the bill which was of course awful the so so so on wrist the next step to go forward is really as you have put it to engage the people and we have started a public dialogue with the community but unfortunately with the unstable and vironment and a chaotic situation i could not do more of that sort of engagement i hope that the

environment will allow me to do it now. kerry lamb and other members of the establishment in hong kong were as surprised as i guess your families were as well apparently they had been expecting that the election would reveal widespread protest fatigue among ordinary citizens instead it did reflect this widespread sympathy for the pro-democracy movement where does that leave carrie lamb i think she's really right now because it was just like russia long said it was like a referendum and it clearly shows that that hong kong people really want the protests to go on and that they are demands should be should be met and that leaves her in a very difficult position because of course she has to listen to beijing as well because she conscious say ok let's put the months people glacier would you have expected carry limb to be more conciliatory than what we heard there and do you think we may still see her make significant concessions it would be the 1st time

that she has backed down i don't think she would have the approval for beijing to back down because backing down would make both the government of the beijing government look kind of ridiculous on the global arena because china has always use strong hand approach to deal with all descendants in china or in hong kong before so we i don't expect to see kerry lamb or the beijing government to back down for it but i think they will have to i think they were approach a wait and see approach for the next week and see how does that peaceful assembly going on next week and then they will decide but i think if their government is not escalating again or if they can stop the police from police brutality then maybe there is a little room for a scaled down of the process but i also think that the vessels actually show that most of hong kong is feel that the use of force by the protesters actually more or less legitimate or at least can be justified because i think the police and the

government has already lost this letter. mysie to rule and to protect its citizens property or their life because in july for example in your long the n.p.r. station when the train members attacked and this impasse arise the police were not there and when poll establishments supporters were attacking passer bys those who were only doing peaceful protests are sticking up and walls the police were not there and they system cannot hold the police responsible for their wrongdoings and that's why hong kong or is peaceful protesters and also the radical processors are very hard to be defied because they see the need to use a force to make them feel safe or at least feel like that let's come back to the use of force in just a moment as we do have a little report about that but i 1st like to try to read the tea leaves in beijing if possible bad so the chinese government's initial response to this election result was quite muted what do you think we can interpret from that what will be going on right now in beijing i think they reorganizing because they were totally

surprised and they didn't expect that this movement would really have such wide support from the from the hong kong public and i think what they'll try to do know is get a feeling for is this something where they can negotiate a couple of years ago when the umbrella movement was the big demonstration in hong kong there were actually some offers from beijing sides towards. some changes to the electoral system i don't think that's on the table again now but i hope at least that they have reconsidering their position let me yeah i think i don't think this is this would make beijing feeling the pressure that they need to reform the electress system that actually it was suggests the otherwise because the government at beijing now knows if it's full democratic election they will lose for sure even though they're from that general figures we can see that the pro-democracy camp can

only have 60 percent of support from hong kong respect that's why then fessor any the majority i think beijing sees that danger of giving full democracy to hong kong because at means they will lose total control over hong kong so i really don't think it will be the chance for beijing to see oh maybe we should do a reform because it wants to tighten it's going to fall over hong kong you know angry and also if you will not do that because if i can down then it means that the protests with scene which has turned. violent recently that means that works so it will happen that beijing will back down let me ask you a little bit more about kerry lambswool because kerry lamb of course is the conduit for beijing even in hong kong so on monday interestingly enough leaders of the main prob agent party were televised bowing collectively in a public apology

a probe ageing labor federation blamed kerry lamb for their group's losses in the election that sounds like she is deeply discredited on both sides both visa v hong kong citizens but also these of the ageing itself so what would you expect to be her fate going forward i think her fate to be going forward will be it will be a very difficult situation for her because you've already framed very good she's in a position where she doesn't get support from any potties. not from the pro-democracy side not from the promised definition camp and not from beijing as well of course beijing says they will support her but she has to listen to kerry live has to listen to beijing and that's making her very difficult to stay in her role actually so question do you glacier are there credible alternatives to carry lab bearing in mind that her term as as far as i know only goes until 2022 is that

correct and in fact these district councils they do not really have much say in larger politics but there is a committee on which members are represented that will have a say in the next chief executive so my question to you would be are there credible alternatives to kerry lim who perhaps could find a middle path that she hasn't found i haven't seen any credible political figures in hong kong that would be able to resolve the political turmoil because this political turmoil not only this 6 months but also that those before the smaller scale for example the umbrella revolution or the ones before these are saying this is signaling there's something very wrong with the system fundamentally there's something wrong with one country 2 systems even because that was supposed to be a temporal solution to the problem of handing back handing over to china but this system it's not a very stable and long term solution for hong kong and china so actually this

signals there has to be something fundamental going on with the system itself to be able to resolve all the political turmoil that has been accumulating sens maybe 2 $1003.00 so i but i don't see any figures that are strong enough or powerful capable enough to stand out and say ok let's do it that sort that way and i believe a democratic fully democratic system is the only way out of this and the chance whatsoever that would ever agree to that we're now talking about the difference between in the sense the short term that we've seen in the protests that we've seen . in these cautious and the much longer term namely the ultimate goal of china that hong kong would be fused into a larger china is there any any chance at all that that ultimate goal for i think it's 2047 a 7 would ever be adjusted. i'm really set to say i see no chance at all i think there's no alternative to fighting for it but in the current

political climate in beijing this is not going to happen the only hope that there is is that there will be a face off that he and that the hong kong situation shows that there are many things wrong with hong kong and that with with china it's they didn't see what was coming up in hong kong there's so many other issues it's not going very well for xi jinping and the communist party the hope would be that they go back to the reform path and see that they are paying a high price for this for the time being hong kong is paying the price but there's a much bigger price to pay and that's coming home to roost for beijing so that fight for human rights let's come back now to the question of the protests and the violence after increasingly violent confrontations between protesting students and police hong kong actually has been pretty quiet this week with the protesters

holding off for now to see how the government responds but they have left little doubt that they are ready to resume let's take a look. at the violent confrontations in hong kong hit a new extreme and police stormed the university buildings leading to numerous injuries on both sides. right from the start the special operations brigades have been taking ever more drastic measures to get the protests under control including tear gas. meanwhile the protesters rage is boiling over and the reluctance to strike back is evaporating on top of the police brutality the hong kong government's refusal to consider the demands of millions of citizens is especially frustrating to the demonstrators. and growing numbers of young activists are left with the impression that peaceful protest will achieve nothing more and more resorting to violence. but frustration can all too easily become blind to destructive rage. look kind of violence is justified in the struggle for democracy

. is that question right or do you how much violence is justified under the circumstances i think it depends on each context of living in a fully functional demoed democratic country of course violence is annoyed justified but for. the situation is a bit different like in june 2 1000000 people nearly a quarter of the population march in the street peacefully but then the government simply replied with no and that's it and refuses to listen all along the way we try to make dialogue with the government simply just ignored us so i read a slogan on the legislative council on the news when people started into it says who taught me that peaceful protest doesn't work and i really feel how upset and frustrated protestors are and i think because protestors in hong kong there is now feels like that the police or the government are not able to protect them as i have

said that's why they have result to force nobody would like that actually it's actually very dangerous and it's very frustrating and tiring at the same time i think most people with enjoy their life peacefully and quiet but they feel like that the government has left them with no choice because they never listen when we tried to go into the system and 2016 candidates got banned from running even this time in the district council election from running for office in his district and it actually shows that the system doesn't work even though you enter the system you can be disqualified as legislators another thing is i don't think or the so-called violent protesters are attacking struck buildings or people are randomly they actually have specific targets and well justified reasons behind that for example they go into n.p.r. stations because before they empty are has allowed the police to go in and they have. deterrence for state assistance and they have how out there what is happening inside for in southwest asia so i feel like it's more or less justified to get it

there so yes let me ask. if she also sees it that way and in view of what ben had told us that he doesn't see this regime in beijing backing down from the long term goal which precludes democracy in hong kong are we basically seeing a generation of young people who may wind up. giving their lives or at least their future chances to this fight they are already doing this because when they go onto the streets right now and protest they risks to be getting arrested and once they get arrested they could be charged and the terms can be up that they could be jailed up to 10 years and they are already doing this and i feel spoken to some protesters very young protesters and what they've been telling me is that they are willing to do this because they feel that they are young enough and even if they get into jail for 10 years when they come out they are still young and that's why they are doing this for. people who are now maybe 2020 something because they feel

like they still have to use to do this and this is this is very sad to me to listening to that that they are trying to sacrifice themselves. and have ever since the protests began there's been a lot of speculation about whether beijing would eventually authorize a tiananmen square type crackdown in other words a violent repression of the protests now surely this election result discredits beijing as well as kerry lamb does that make a crackdown war or less likely. i mean home medium term i would hope it makes it less likely i don't think it would work in hong kong because this is not like gentleman central square with a lot of people the protests to souls. and and evaporate that's this this water metaphor that hong kong protesters have of use i don't think nowadays with the technological means that beijing has you need

a crackdown with tanks i'm very pessimistic though about. whether beijing is going to give the protesters more room i think they're slowly working their way through the ranks and putting pressure on them with every possible means and i'm afraid in some ways this is going to work because they're making people's lives felt so how would you answer the question that was at the end of our report just now how much violence is legitimate under such circumstances i don't think the violence has done the protest a great service you know better how to negotiate with your own government from a foreign perspective this has really undermined the narrative and it has given the big propaganda. present to beijing because they could argue look at this violence i think the more subtle means gathering in molds and singing glory to hong kong is is much more effective and much more subtle and makes

it much more easy for foreign governments to support this not only towards hong kong but also in their communications with beijing let me ask precisely to the point of foreign governments what you think the outside world should be doing hunch when said the election is a wake up call to the whole world what would you want to see other countries other powers doing you know the countries should seeing the case of hong kong or even in other parts of china for example. in the western part of china. the weaker what they're what they have been suffering readers are the ethnic minority in china and there recently there have been leaks that showing that proving that that they are on the so-called ethnic genocide some people with describing their sexual being held in concentration camps just exactly end so i think the case of hong kong and also and she jump for example really shows that how how beijing is governing its

cities or other places and i think the whole world should now really look into this and say no that's not going to to work this way and if you want to defend human rights that's the point right now that's time right now to do this and if you wait for an other 5 or 10 years who knows what china who grow into submission to the u.s. just has passed in relation not only to hong kong but also the. a hong kong human rights and democracy act that would sanction officials responsible for human rights violations and also makes economic relations with hong kong conditional on the u.s. secretary of state certifying that hong kong remains autonomous from china would you say that kind of pressure is helpful and should there be more that for example also from europe from germany i think is very a really helpful because right after the bill is passed and both of parliament and the u.s. . chinese authorities were furious 7 different organizations from the authority

have spoken as like a combo they skip saying that they regret that bill was passing something like that and i think if the european union or germany will at least propose some legislature or some policies like that this kind of gesture showing that we're not going to tolerate chinese violation of human rights would be very helpful in terms of the hong kong situation or those i think my thought annoyed teams in china because it's a really good show of gesture saying that we are actually closely monitoring and we may will take action the situation worsens there's a. a lot of concern here in germany also in europe in general that the u.s. and china have been coming gauged in a standoff that almost resembles a new cold war and i often hear voices in germany saying we have to find a middle way in this case does hong kong do the only go or show us that germany needs to take a much stronger position i think it's right that we have to find some kind of

middle way because we just don't we're not the actor on the global stage that the u.s. is but i think everyone agrees that at the end we are on the western side of things if we are forced to take sides then we'll of course we stand with. western values the question is are we being forced and issues like on kong and chin junk to put this force on us and that is good because it forces us to make big decisions let me ask all of you very briefly were basically the end of our time wake up call to beijing will it be heard not only there but in other countries yes or no yes yes oh ok well that's consensus thank you very much to all of you for being with us and thanks to you out there for tuning in see you soon.

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a chance for peace and justice in colombia. that was their hope in nov 26th. but how have things really been since fark signed the deal with the government as it would mean. is history believing in something. along the road to peace. in 15 minutes on d w. c

and now completely affectionately but as affectionately as you can. be mayor put him in the middle of his election campaign in the year 2000 but documentary was filmed for russian television. to turn the camera back on of course the film secretly chronicled a power grab that actually everything was precisely planned instruction. featuring a top supporting role. to the freedom of russia. and featuring a lead role like you've never seen before. the year that a mirror of it should do the ends justify the means. rutins witnesses starts december 13th on t.w. . the power of ford's. where i come from i

never saw the sun question it could. have gone up in brazil the sun was always a man since the portuguese word for sun is masculine when i moved to germany as a 10 year old i was 2nd to him until the end that would change how i see the world because into. the family. see me now but the side of a girl it's almost time in the ponytail instead of a deep voice exterminate the guy seemed absolutely incredible. i realize how language shakes thinking how definitions of fire not only mental image just put our whole perception of the world. inside save my life and was one of the reasons i became a journalist i'm a story telling and i use my words to help with intercultural understanding my name is william and i work to tell people.

this is d.w. news live from berlin the european parliament declares a climate emergency e.u. lawmakers pile the pressure on the incoming commission president obama lion to keep who would make the bloc climate neutral by 2015 also on the program. china condemns the united states for meddling in its domestic affairs after president trump signs a bill supporting hong kong pro-democracy activists beijing promises counter measures.