Neither the Occupy Central in 2014 nor this year's anti-extradition bill protest has anything to do with Hong Kong's political reform but is a well-plotted color revolution, labor union representatives and experts said. 

The comments made on Saturday which saw black-clad protesters gather on Saturday night to "commemorate" the fifth anniversary of the illegal "Occupy Central" movement that gripped Hong Kong in 2014. 

The gathering soon again erupted into chaos and violence, damaging public property and disrupting the city's transportation.

About a half hour after a permitted gathering in Tamar Park nearby the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) government complex began on Saturday night, a group of radicals outside the park attempted to damage the water barricades and constantly provoked the police officers on the ground by pointing the laser beams toward them. 

By ignoring repeated police warnings, protesters illegally occupied Harcourt Road in front of the complex, and some rioters hurled bricks on windows of the government building and continued flashing laser pointers. 

"It has always been an illegal siege, a complete color revolution since 2014," Stanley Ng Chau-pei, president of the Hong Kong Federation of Trade Unions, told the Global Times on Saturday. 

Illegal demonstrations damage society and rule of law, which Hong Kong society has not reflected sufficiently on, he said. Some key leaders of the 2014 movement were either released on bail or sentenced to probation or community service, and "that's definitely serious damage to the Hong Kong's legal system," Ng added. 

The aftermath of the 2014 Occupy Central is widely seen as a "bitter pill" that Hong Kong had swallowed in the past years, inflicting long-term impact on the city. 

To achieve political reform, the community needs to engage in dialogue, premised on a legal basis and under a peaceful atmosphere with mutual trust, to narrow differences and attain a consensus from all sides, a spokesperson of the HKSAR government said on Saturday. 

"Months of protests have turned violent, which were well organized and planned, fueled by intense social divergence over the years," Ng noted. 

And months of protests this year have made such divergence increasingly apparent, and tolerance for violence as well as illegal activities also heavily weighed on the education of the next generation, he added. 

The intervention of foreign forces has become more apparent in Hong Kong affairs, and by using such social divergence, opposition groups, which have been hijacked by the external forces, have been engaged in a color revolution since 2014, observers said. 

The US Congressional-Executive Commission on China issued a statement on Friday ahead of the illegal "Occupy Central" movement anniversary, reminding about "the accelerated erosion of Hong Kong's autonomy," which is widely seen as evidence of foreign intervention in Hong Kong affairs and China's internal affairs.  

 "By continuing this movement, anti-government forces could continue to stir public opinion, increase their stake, and attempt to take over power," Tang Fei, a member of the council of the Chinese Association of Hong Kong and Macao Studies in Hong Kong, told the Global Times, noting the movement and ongoing riots are no other than a color revolution. 


Newspaper headline: HK riots, ‘Occupy Central’ a color revolution