"The police went in and grabbed this guy and pulled him through the crowd into a paddy-wagon," the witness said. "That launched the protest. Banners came out. Slogans came out and in [the space of] five minutes you had 600 people shutting down the street that leads to the provincial government [building]." Several protesters were dragged away by security forces, according to the South China Morning Post, and online photographs showed hundreds of black-clad police monitoring the event.