How Tear Gas Attack Ignited Hong Kong Democracy Protests
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Eighteen months before the first tear gas shell hissed through the crowds of students in central Hong Kong, the city’s police began training on how to keep control of one of the world’s largest financial centers.
Not since riots in the 1960s had Hong Kong’s cops had to worry about the messiness of mass political unrest. Now, with China asserting its hold over the city, a new breed of pro-democracy activists was threatening to take over the central quarters.