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Horrifying footage has emerged showing a man being doused in petrol and set on fire during a row with protesters in Hong Kong.

It was an extremely violent day as the man was left fighting for his life in hospital and Hong Kong police shot and critically injured a demonstrator in a separate incident.

In the video, anti-government protesters tell the man to "f*** your mother" and "go back" to China's mainland and he says "f***ing British" and tells them "you all are not Chinese".

The man - whose head is already bloodied after he was allegedly assaulted - is splashed with liquid and turned into a human fireball as someone holds a lighter to his shirt and engulfs him in flames.

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The man desperately tries to put out the fire and stumbles away.

Terrified witnesses scream and scramble out of the way on a pedestrian bridge in Ma On Shan, a town along the eastern coast of the Chinese-ruled territory of Hong Kong.

The man managed to take off his flaming shirt and was seen walking around with severe burns to his face, chest, stomach and arms.

He was in a critical condition in an intensive care unit at the Prince of Wales Hospital following the incident, which happened just before 1pm local time on Monday, according to Hong Kong officials.

The man had second-degree burns on 28 per cent of his body, mainly on his chest and arms, the South China Morning Post reported.

Before being set on fire, Hong Kong media said, the man suffered a head injury from being assaulted.

It was an extremely violent day as the man was set on fire and Hong Kong police shot and wounded a protester, who was left fighting for his life in hospital.

The shooting happened in Sai Wan Ho on the eastern side of the island.

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(Image: Cupid News/AFP via Getty Images)

Footage posted online shows the wounded 21-year-old man, who attends a local university, lying in a pool of blood with his eyes wide open.

In the video, a protester, wearing a white hoodie and mask, walks towards a policeman, as if to challenge him.

The officer draws his gun and points it at him at close range and grabs him round the neck.

As the officer holds the man with his left hand, he shoots another approaching masked protester at close range with his right hand.

Three shots ring out and the man falls to the ground.

(Image: Cupid News/AFP via Getty Images)

The fallen man is pinned to the ground by an officer holding a gun to his head. The man in white escapes.

Witness Anson Yip, 36, told Reuters that protesters were throwing rubbish to create a roadblock when police ran to the scene.

He added: "They didn't fight and the police ran and directly shot.

"There was three sounds, like 'pam, pam, pam'.

"They (the protesters) are against the government, that's why the police just shot them."

(Image: REUTERS)

A source told the South China Morning Post that the gunshot victim was sedated in hospital.

A friend who visited the wounded man in hospital told Reuters: "My friend didn't actually attack the police or do anything."

The friend, identifying himself as Rigan, 19, added: "They just shot him. My friend is optimistic, friendly and willing to help others."

The man fell just a couple of metres from a large makeshift memorial to a student who died from a fall in a car park last week, the blood staining the street next to candles, flowers, and anti-government posters.

In other incidents, a police officer ploughed his motorcycle into demonstrators in Kwai Fong, masked protesters attacked a man in a street in Mong Kok, an area in Kowloon, and demonstrators hurled petrol bombs at officers on university campuses.

(Image: AFP via Getty Images)

In central Hong Kong, police threw a woman to the debris-filled street and pepper-sprayed her in the face as protesters - many of them masked and wearing black - hurled plastic crates at officers.

Officers also fired tear gas in the business district during the 24th straight week of pro-democracy unrest.

Protesters blocked streets with fires and barricades as office workers on their lunch breaks crowded the pavements and hurled anti-government abuse.

Protesters ran or crouched under umbrellas and some passersby took cover inside the Landmark shopping mall, one of the oldest and most expensive in Central, as volley after volley of tear gas rained down.

A number of buildings, including a Bank of China branch, were vandalised or set on fire.

(Image: REUTERS)

Protests have happened almost daily in Hong Kong, sometimes with little or no notice, disrupting business and piling pressure on the government.

But it was rare for tear gas to be fired during working hours in Central, lined with bank headquarters and top-brand shops at the foot of Victoria Peak.

The violence usually begins after dusk. Some offices were closing early and workers were heading home.

Police later fired tear gas in the same area.

Protesters and residents formed a barricade of polystyrene boxes around the bloodstain beside a pedestrian crossing after police forensic teams left the scene.

(Image: REUTERS)

A 24-year-old man, who only gave his surname as Wing, said: "When I arrived the road was blocked and people were yelling at the police, calling them murderers."

Police said in a statement protesters had set up barricades across the city and warned demonstrators to "stop their illegal acts immediately".

The unrest also spread to Mong Kok, one of the most densely populated areas on earth, on the Kowloon peninsula and often the site of street clashes.

Police used water cannon to break up protesters.

Amnesty International condemned the actions of police, saying: "The live rounds fired by police are clear evidence of reckless use of force.

(Image: AFP via Getty Images)

"Another policeman was seen driving at high speed into a group of protesters on a motorbike.

"These are not policing measures - these are officers out of control with a mindset of retaliation."

Protesters are angry about what they see as police brutality and meddling by Beijing in the freedoms guaranteed to the former British colony by the "one country, two systems" formula put in place when the territory returned to Chinese rule in 1997.

Some have called for independence, a red line for Communist Party leaders in Beijing.

China denies interfering and has blamed Western countries for stirring up trouble.

More than 260 people have been arrested in connection with the protests in the last week.

(Image: AFP via Getty Images)

The latest violence comes after student Chow Tsz-lok, 22, died in hospital last week following a fall as protesters were being dispersed by police.

Violence flared at several university campuses as news of the latest shooting spread, with witnesses reporting tense standoffs between students, protesters and police.

All classes were cancelled.

Police fired tear gas at Chinese University, across the river from Ma On Shan in the New Territories, where students hurled petrol bombs and barricaded the campus like a fortress.

Students set fire to debris at the Polytechnic University on the Kowloon side of Victoria Harbour.

"I feel a strong sense of helplessness," said one Chinese University student who only gave his name as Chan.

(Image: JEROME FAVRE/EPA-EFE/REX)

"Who wouldn't want to attend class if they could? The government still isn't listening to us."

He was guarding a back gate at the university.

The old Tai Po Road that snakes uphill from Sha Tin and often featured in 1960s black and white Cantonese movies, was barricaded with fencing, wooden boards, bamboo, poles, bins and other debris.

Services on some train and subway lines were disrupted early on Monday, with traffic snarled and riot police deployed near stations and shopping malls after protesters called for a general strike.

Hong Kong's stock market was down 2.9 per cent in mid-afternoon trade, outpacing losses in other parts of the region.

China has a garrison of up to 12,000 troops in Hong Kong who have kept to barracks throughout the unrest, but it has vowed to crush any attempts at independence.