Aides, social workers complain of 'unfair arrests'

Aides, social workers complain of 'unfair arrests'

A large crowd of people gathered at Chater Garden on Friday night in protest against the alleged ‘unreasonable arrests’ of social workers and politicians’ aides during clearance operations.



The rally was organised by the Social and Political Organization Workers Union – a group of people who work for legislators, political parties and non-governmental organisations. It claimed a turnout of 23,000 people.



A spokesman for the group, Tony Kwok, accused the police of unfairly treating them with violence, even as they work to bring down the temperature at various anti-government rallies.



“They’re there to assist the councillors, to ease the tensions between the police and the people of Hong Kong”, he said.



“They’re trying to ease the tension of confrontations and provide support to arrested persons. However, we are facing a daunting situation, of which the police have treated us with violence. They’ve made unreasonable arrests in the name of obstructing police duty.”



Some people at the rally further accused police of employing unnecessary violence against protesters.



A medical worker said people who vandalised MTR stations, for example, did not deserve to be beaten or pepper sprayed. She said while some protesters were indeed violent, the police employed much worse violence.



“For those citizens, they just broke the Octopus machines, they’re just objects! Not human beings!” she said.