Police told NBC News the student, identified as Tsang Chi-kin, was charged with two counts of assaulting a police officer as tens of thousands of black-clad protesters took to the streets of the semiautonomous territory on Tuesday.
The shooting Tuesday happened amid one of the most violent days of the demonstrations. Marked the first time a protester was struck by live ammunition, the shooting has inflamed anger against police.
Oct. 2, 201901:15
Police officials defended the officer on Wednesday, saying his life was in imminent danger and he fired as the teen struck him with a metal rod. Queen Elizabeth hospital confirmed with NBC News that Tsang’s condition was stable after surgery and that he was recovering in the intensive care unit.
A total of 269 people, ranging from ages 12 to 71, were arrested on the day, police said. Cases began to be heard in Shantin court Thursday.
Thousands of people, including Tsang's fellow students at a Hong Kong college, rallied Wednesday to demand police accountability for the shooting.
Veta Chan reported from Hong Kong and Linda Givetash from London.
Linda Givetash
Linda Givetash is a reporter based in London. She previously worked for The Canadian Press in Vancouver and Nation Media in Uganda.
HONG KONG — He was the kind of 18-year-old high school student more interested in basketball than studying. One of four student vice presidents, who classmates say never showed an interest in politics until this year.
Friends described him as charming and funny, with long hair he sometimes kept in a ponytail. Just another student. Not an icon. Not a symbol. Not a lightning rod.
But on Tuesday, the student, Tsang Chi-kin, became all of those things when he was shot by the police during a day of violent protests in Hong Kong.
The shooting — the first time police officers in the semiautonomous Chinese territory used a live round against a demonstrator in nearly four months of protests — represented a new escalation in the violence that has roiled the city.
Mr. Tsang was shot in the chest. The hollow-point bullet narrowly missed his heart and spine, but pierced a lung. As of Wednesday, he was in intensive care but in stable condition, according to the Hospital Authority.
“He’s a very fortunate person, when you look at the organs that are there,” said Dr. Darren Mann, a Hong Kong surgeon and expert in ballistic injuries.
The teenager was one of many thousands of protesters who fanned out across Hong Kong on Tuesday and battled the police for hours through fogs of tear gas. The street brawls started just hours after Xi Jinping, the Chinese leader, presided over a carefully choreographed military parade in Beijing to celebrate 70 years of Communist Party control.
The shooting, which has been replayed for hours on local television news channels, has divided the city.
Supporters of the pro-democracy protests say the episode epitomizes all that is wrong with a Hong Kong government that has prioritized brute force over genuine political dialogue. The movement’s critics, on the other hand, say the shooting highlights the shameful excesses of a youth-led movement that has increasingly resorted to vandalism and attacks on police officers.
Seven friends of Mr. Tsang discussed the young man’s activities, but insisted on anonymity because they feared retaliation by the police or others if their identities were known.
Mr. Tsang, they said, was barely aware of politics until June when the first major protests against a bill that would have allowed Hong Kong residents to be extradited to the mainland for trial convulsed the city.
The young man, they said, became more committed to the movement, regularly attending protests, participating in political discussion online and advocating for greater democracy in Hong Kong.
Starting this summer, Mr. Tsang played a leading role in a group of a dozen protesters from several high schools who attended protests together, his friends said. But a personal dispute last weekend led to a rift in the once tight-knit clique.
As a result, Mr. Tsang was with a half-dozen people at the protest on Tuesday in Tsuen Wan, a working-class neighborhood of residential tower blocks, when he was shot. Mr. Tsang and the other teenagers overlapped their open umbrellas to create a nylon wall as they charged the police, the friends said.
In a video of the shooting, brick-throwing protesters chase outnumbered police officers for about two blocks, until a small group of officers becomes separated. A protester who appears to be Mr. Tsang — wearing swim goggles and a gas mask and carrying a pool kickboard — is seen leading a handful of black-clad protesters who chase a riot officer and knock him to the ground. They kick the officer and beat him with what appear to be metal pipes.
When a different police officer approaches with a drawn handgun to rescue his colleague on the ground, the protester turns to him and strikes his trigger hand with a pipe. Instantly, the officer fires on the man at point-blank range.
The Hong Kong police commissioner, Stephen Lo, said the officer who fired on Mr. Tsang had acted in a “legal and reasonable” manner, having given a verbal warning before opening fire. The officer had been assaulted at close quarters, Mr. Lo said, and had no other choice but to shoot. “The range was not determined by the police officer, but by the perpetrator,” he said.
Mr. Lo added that the police had arrested Mr. Tsang, but had not yet decided whether to press charges. On Wednesday morning, the principal and vice principal of the Ho Chuen Yiu public secondary school said that Mr. Tsang would not be punished and would keep his place in the school.
Some supporters of the police and Hong Kong’s pro-Beijing political elites urged the school to take a harder line.
“Could you not directly denounce his wrongdoing,” Leung Chun-ying, a former Hong Kong chief executive, wrote on his Facebook page on Wednesday. Before being shot, Mr. Leung wrote, Mr. Tsang had “beat the police on the streets in full gear along with other rioters.”
Joseph Cheng, a retired professor of political science at the City University of Hong Kong, said the shooting could turn Mr. Tsang into a powerful symbol for activists on either side of the protests.
In less than 24 hours after the shooting, Mr. Tsang was being hailed as a hero and derided as a thug.
“I don’t know if they were real thugs or students, but they all have been seriously brainwashed,” Junius Ho, a pro-Beijing legislator in Hong Kong, said in a video broadcast on Facebook Live.
Hundreds of people gathered in the upscale Central district at lunchtime on Wednesday. They chanted slogans and sang the protest movement’s anthem, “Glory To Hong Kong,” as a show of support for Mr. Tsang.
“They shouldn’t shoot at anybody, adults or children. But especially not at young people — it’s really important for them to have a future,” said Susanna Cheung, an office worker who joined the march during her lunch break. “The students need our support and need to know that Hong Kong people stand with them.”
Mr. Cheng, the retired political scientist, said the shooting could propel Mr. Tsang to the kind of international prominence that Joshua Wong, a leader of the city’s Umbrella Movement in 2014, achieved at a similar age.
On Wednesday, a group of protesters lionized Mr. Tsang at a news conference they held at the base of a 30-story public housing block in Tsuen Wan. It was across the street from the public high school and not far from where he was shot.
A row of masked protesters sat at tables and discussed their friendship and admiration for Mr. Tsang. One of them, a student, denounced the police and called for further protests to honor Mr. Tsang, saying, “Please promise me that you will never forgive.”
But recent alumni of the school said in interviews that the housing project was mainly occupied by older families who were strongly pro-Beijing. And not everyone who heard the protesters supported their message.
At one point during the news conference, a drone buzzed high above the apartment tower and strafed the crowd below with rotten eggs.
HONG KONG — He was the kind of 18-year-old high school student more interested in basketball than studying. One of four student vice presidents, who classmates say never showed an interest in politics until this year.
Friends described him as charming and funny, with long hair he sometimes kept in a ponytail. Just another student. Not an icon. Not a symbol. Not a lightning rod.
But on Tuesday, the student, Tsang Chi-kin, became all of those things when he was shot by the police during a day of violent protests in Hong Kong.
The shooting — the first time police officers in the semiautonomous Chinese territory used a live round against a demonstrator in nearly four months of protests — represented a new escalation in the violence that has roiled the city.
Mr. Tsang was shot in the chest. The hollow-point bullet narrowly missed his heart and spine, but pierced a lung. As of Wednesday, he was in intensive care but in stable condition, according to the Hospital Authority.
“He’s a very fortunate person, when you look at the organs that are there,” said Dr. Darren Mann, a Hong Kong surgeon and expert in ballistic injuries.
The teenager was one of many thousands of protesters who fanned out across Hong Kong on Tuesday and battled the police for hours through fogs of tear gas. The street brawls started just hours after Xi Jinping, the Chinese leader, presided over a carefully choreographed military parade in Beijing to celebrate 70 years of Communist Party control.
The shooting, which has been replayed for hours on local television news channels, has divided the city.
Supporters of the pro-democracy protests say the episode epitomizes all that is wrong with a Hong Kong government that has prioritized brute force over genuine political dialogue. The movement’s critics, on the other hand, say the shooting highlights the shameful excesses of a youth-led movement that has increasingly resorted to vandalism and attacks on police officers.
Seven friends of Mr. Tsang discussed the young man’s activities, but insisted on anonymity because they feared retaliation by the police or others if their identities were known.
Mr. Tsang, they said, was barely aware of politics until June when the first major protests against a bill that would have allowed Hong Kong residents to be extradited to the mainland for trial convulsed the city.
The young man, they said, became more committed to the movement, regularly attending protests, participating in political discussion online and advocating for greater democracy in Hong Kong.
Starting this summer, Mr. Tsang played a leading role in a group of a dozen protesters from several high schools who attended protests together, his friends said. But a personal dispute last weekend led to a rift in the once tight-knit clique.
As a result, Mr. Tsang was with a half-dozen people at the protest on Tuesday in Tsuen Wan, a working-class neighborhood of residential tower blocks, when he was shot. Mr. Tsang and the other teenagers overlapped their open umbrellas to create a nylon wall as they charged the police, the friends said.
In a video of the shooting, brick-throwing protesters chase outnumbered police officers for about two blocks, until a small group of officers becomes separated. A protester who appears to be Mr. Tsang — wearing swim goggles and a gas mask and carrying a pool kickboard — is seen leading a handful of black-clad protesters who chase a riot officer and knock him to the ground. They kick the officer and beat him with what appear to be metal pipes.
When a different police officer approaches with a drawn handgun to rescue his colleague on the ground, the protester turns to him and strikes his trigger hand with a pipe. Instantly, the officer fires on the man at point-blank range.
The Hong Kong police commissioner, Stephen Lo, said the officer who fired on Mr. Tsang had acted in a “legal and reasonable” manner, having given a verbal warning before opening fire. The officer had been assaulted at close quarters, Mr. Lo said, and had no other choice but to shoot. “The range was not determined by the police officer, but by the perpetrator,” he said.
Mr. Lo added that the police had arrested Mr. Tsang, but had not yet decided whether to press charges. On Wednesday morning, the principal and vice principal of the Ho Chuen Yiu public secondary school said that Mr. Tsang would not be punished and would keep his place in the school.
Some supporters of the police and Hong Kong’s pro-Beijing political elites urged the school to take a harder line.
“Could you not directly denounce his wrongdoing,” Leung Chun-ying, a former Hong Kong chief executive, wrote on his Facebook page on Wednesday. Before being shot, Mr. Leung wrote, Mr. Tsang had “beat the police on the streets in full gear along with other rioters.”
Joseph Cheng, a retired professor of political science at the City University of Hong Kong, said the shooting could turn Mr. Tsang into a powerful symbol for activists on either side of the protests.
In less than 24 hours after the shooting, Mr. Tsang was being hailed as a hero and derided as a thug.
“I don’t know if they were real thugs or students, but they all have been seriously brainwashed,” Junius Ho, a pro-Beijing legislator in Hong Kong, said in a video broadcast on Facebook Live.
Hundreds of people gathered in the upscale Central district at lunchtime on Wednesday. They chanted slogans and sang the protest movement’s anthem, “Glory To Hong Kong,” as a show of support for Mr. Tsang.
“They shouldn’t shoot at anybody, adults or children. But especially not at young people — it’s really important for them to have a future,” said Susanna Cheung, an office worker who joined the march during her lunch break. “The students need our support and need to know that Hong Kong people stand with them.”
Mr. Cheng, the retired political scientist, said the shooting could propel Mr. Tsang to the kind of international prominence that Joshua Wong, a leader of the city’s Umbrella Movement in 2014, achieved at a similar age.
On Wednesday, a group of protesters lionized Mr. Tsang at a news conference they held at the base of a 30-story public housing block in Tsuen Wan. It was across the street from the public high school and not far from where he was shot.
A row of masked protesters sat at tables and discussed their friendship and admiration for Mr. Tsang. One of them, a student, denounced the police and called for further protests to honor Mr. Tsang, saying, “Please promise me that you will never forgive.”
But recent alumni of the school said in interviews that the housing project was mainly occupied by older families who were strongly pro-Beijing. And not everyone who heard the protesters supported their message.
At one point during the news conference, a drone buzzed high above the apartment tower and strafed the crowd below with rotten eggs.
The State Department inspector general will brief congressional committee staff about unspecified documents on Wednesday.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo responded to House committees scheduling depositions from State Department officials, calling it an attempt to "bully" diplomats.
House committee chairs warned Pompeo not to obstruct the impeachment inquiry.
Pompeo confirmed that he was on a July call between President Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelesnky where Trump urged Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden.
Soon after the call, White House officials moved a record of the call to a highly classified computer system, severely restricting who could access it.
Washington -- House Democrats leading the impeachment inquiry into President Trump are maintaining pressure on the State Department, warning Secretary of State Mike Pompeo against obstructing their probe.
On Tuesday, Pompeo accused Democrats of trying to "bully" and "intimidate" State Department officials by scheduling depositions about their involvement with President Trump's call with the Ukrainian president on short notice.
"I am concerned with aspects of your request, described more fully below, that can be understood only as an attempt to intimidate, bully, and treat improperly the distinguished professionals of the Department of State, including several career Foreign Service Officers," Pompeo wrote to the chairman of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs.
Pompeo was revealed to have been on the call between Mr. Trump and the Ukrainian president, a development first reported by The Wall Street Journal. That development prompted the chairmen of three committees to warn Pompeo he would be considered a "fact witness" and should play no role in dictating investigators' access to witnesses or documents.
"He should immediately cease intimidating Department witnesses in order to protect himself and the President," they said in a statement.
The clash comes ahead of a hastily scheduled mysterious briefing requested by the State Department's inspector general, who requested a meeting to review unspecified documents with staffers of relevant congressional committees on Wednesday afternoon. -- Stefan Becket
Pompeo confirms he was on call between Trump and Zelesnky
7:25 a.m. Addressing reporters in Rome during an overseas visit, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo confirmed that he was on the July call between President Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelesnky.
"I was on the phone call," he told the press. "I know precisely what the American policy has been with respect to Ukraine. It's been remarkably consistent, and we will continue to drive those sets of outcomes," he added.
The secretary neglected to answer questions on whether or not he had heard anything on the call that had raised any red flags, but said the call was about helping Ukraine get corruption of their government and "taking down the threat that Russia poses to Ukraine."
He said that effort will continue "even while all this noise in Washington is going on."
On the outstanding depositions for State Department officials to come before Congress, Pompeo argued that congressional committees had said State wouldn't be able to be present to protect information.
"What we objected to was the demands that were put...deeply violating fundamental principles of separation of powers. They contacted state department employees directly. Told them not to contact legal counsel in the State Department. They said that the State Department wouldn't be able to be present. There are important constitutional prerogatives that the executive branch has to be present so that we can protect important information so our partners, countries like Italy, can have confidence that the information they provide to the state department will continue to be protected," Pompeo explained.
He added of his stern letter to committee chairs: "So the response that I provided to them was one that acknowledged that we will of course do our Constitutional duty to cooperate with this co-equal branch but we are going to do so in a way that is consistent with the fundamental values of the American system."
"We won't tolerate folks on Capitol Hill bullying and intimidating state dept employees, that's unacceptable and its not something that I'm going to permit to happen," Pompeo urged.
- Emily Tillett
Australia's PM downplays call with Trump
6:40 a.m. Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison downplayed his phone call with President Trump over the Russian interference probe, saying the conversation was not "ladled with pressure."
In an interview with Sky News, Morrison said Mr. Trump contacted him to ask "for a point of contact" for Attorney General William Barr's investigation into what triggered the FBI's Russia probe.
"A couple of weeks ago the president contacted me and asked for a point of contact between the Australian government and the U.S. attorney, which I was happy to do on the basis that was something we'd already committed to do," he said.
"It was a fairly uneventful conversation," Morrison defended, later calling the conversation "brief" and a "fairly polite request."
Barr had asked Mr. Trump to call Morrison to alert him that the attorney general would be reaching out, a department official previously told CBS News. The New York Times first reported the two leaders had spoken. Morrison was just one of several foreign officials Barr had sought out for assistance in the Department of Justice's review of the origins of the Mueller probe.
-- Emily Tillett
Giuliani threatens lawsuit against members of Congress
6:00 a.m. During his most recent appearance on Fox News, President Trump's personal attorney Rudy Giuliani said he's considering filing a lawsuit against individual congress members for violating his, the president's, and possibly the administration's civil and constitutional rights.
Although Giuliani only specifically cited House Intelligence Committee Chair Adam Schiff as a potential target, he says that Congress has "violated" the president's ability to perform Article 2 of the Constitution and violated Giuliani's attorney-client privilege.
In terms of his subpoena, Giuliani says he does not regret revealing on national television the text messages he has with Ukrainian officials and the state department. He admitted that he has "many more," however, Giuliani also said that turning them over was a "complicated" issue because they're all his "work product" as an attorney.
State Department inspector general to brief committee staff on Ukraine docs
Tuesday, 6:03 p.m.: The State Department's internal watchdog invited congressional committee staff to attend a briefing on Capitol Hill on Wednesday "to discuss and provide staff with copies of documents related to the State Department and Ukraine."
Inspector General Steve Linick invited Democratic and Republican staffers from eight House and Senate committees to attend the briefing. A copy of the invitation seen by CBS News was designated "urgent," and said the inspector general "obtained the documents from the Acting Legal Advisor of the Department of State."
Several senior congressional aides from the committees said they don't know what is in the documents and that the invitation came as a surprise to them.
"It could be anything," one aide said. -- Nancy Cordes
House Intel says ex-Ukraine envoy will testify as planned
4:50 p.m.: The special envoy to Ukraine who abruptly resigned his post after his apparent entanglement with Rudy Giuliani came to light will appear as scheduled for a deposition before House lawmakers on Thursday, a House Intelligence Committee official said.
Kurt Volker resigned Friday amid scrutiny over his supposed role in facilitating contacts between Giuliani and various Ukrainian officials. He was scheduled to appear before the House committees leading the impeachment probe on Thursday and will appear behind closed doors as planned, the official said.
The official said former Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch will now appear on October 11, under an agreement reached with her counsel. She was previously scheduled to appear on Wednesday.
Both officials are among the five included in Pompeo's earlier letter to the committees protesting the demand for their testimony. -- Olivia Gazis and Stefan Becket
House chairmen accuse Pompeo of witness intimidation
Pompeo accuses House Democrats trying to "bully" diplomats
2:32 p.m.: The chairmen of three House committees demanding documents from Pompeo and depositions of State Department officials responded to the secretary's letter Tuesday afternoon, accusing him of obstructing their investigation.
"Secretary Pompeo was reportedly on the call when the President pressed Ukraine to smear his political opponent. If true, Secretary Pompeo is now a fact witness in the House impeachment inquiry," the chairmen wrote. "He should immediately cease intimidating Department witnesses in order to protect himself and the President."
The letter came from the chairmen of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, Intelligence Committee and Oversight and Reform Committee -- Eliot Engel, Adam Schiff and Elijah Cummings, respectively.
"Any effort to intimidate witnesses or prevent them from talking with Congress -- including State Department employees -- is illegal and will constitute evidence of obstruction of the impeachment inquiry," the lawmakers continued. "In response, Congress may infer from this obstruction that any withheld documents and testimony would reveal information that corroborates the whistleblower complaint."
The chairmen said they are "committed to protecting witnesses from harassment and intimidation, and we expect their full compliance and that of the Department of State." -- Stefan Becket
Pompeo responds to Democrats' demand for depositions
10:51 a.m.: In a letter to the chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo accused Democrats of trying to "intimidate" and "bully" State Department officials with a request for testimony about their involvement in the Ukraine call. Pompeo said the committee's request does not provide enough time for the department and its employees to adequately prepare.
Pompeo, who is traveling in Italy, wrote that the request "can be understood only as an attempt to intimidate, bully, and treat improperly the distinguished professionals of the Department of State, including several career Foreign Service Officers."
I'm concerned with aspects of the Committee's request that can be understood only as an attempt to intimidate, bully, & treat improperly the distinguished professionals of the Department of State, including several career FSOs. pic.twitter.com/QRtMaXlhQM
He added, "Let me be clear: I will not tolerate such tactics, and I will use all means at my disposal to prevent and expose any attempts to intimidate the dedicated professionals whom I am proud to lead and serve alongside at the Department of State."
On Friday, three committee chairs wrote to Pompeo informing him they had scheduled depositions for five officials: former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch, former special envoy Kurt Volker, Deputy Assistant Secretary George Kent, State Department Counselor T. Ulrich Brechbuhl and U.S. Ambassador to the E.U. Gordon Sondland. All five officials were mentioned in the whistleblower complaint.
Volker resigned abruptly from his post as special envoy for Ukraine on Friday and is scheduled to be deposed on Thursday.
The chairmen also issued a subpoena for documents from Pompeo related to the call. -- Emily Tillett
The government's final Brexit proposals will include customs checks on the island of Ireland.
The BBC's Laura Kuenssberg said Boris Johnson's plans will see Northern Ireland "in a different relationship with the EU to the rest of the UK".
Boris Johnson is addressing the Tory conference before submitting the new proposals to the EU.
The European Commission said they will "examine it objectively" and "listen carefully to the UK".
The Commission's president, Jean-Claude Juncker will talk to the PM on the phone later, while negotiating teams will meet in Brussels.
In his first speech at the event as prime minister, he will call it a "fair and reasonable" Brexit compromise, and say only by leaving the EU on 31 October can the UK "move on".
Mr Johnson will also claim the public will no longer be "taken for fools" by those who want to delay or block the process.
Tory Chairman James Cleverly said the UK had been "flexible and pragmatic", and now the EU must be the same.
On the eve of his speech, Mr Johnson told a conference fringe meeting in Manchester, hosted by the DUP, that he hoped to reach a deal with the EU over the course of "the next few days".
The government has insisted it will not negotiate a further delay beyond the Halloween deadline, saying this would be unnecessary and costly for the UK.
However, under the terms of a law passed by Parliament last month, the PM faces having to request another extension unless MPs back the terms of withdrawal by 19 October - two days after a summit of European leaders.
On Tuesday, Mr Johnson dismissed leaked reports that customs posts could be set up on either side of the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland.
He said suggestions the UK wanted "clearance zones" for goods as part of a package of alternative arrangements to replace the Irish backstop were wide of the mark.
While he conceded some customs checks would be needed as the UK leaves the EU's customs union and single market, he said technology could keep them to an "absolute minimum".
What is in the proposals?
The issue of the Irish border - and how to keep it free from border checks when it becomes the frontier between the UK and the EU - has been a key sticking point in Brexit negotiations.
Mr Johnson says the solution reached by the EU and Theresa May, the backstop, is "anti-democratic" and "inconsistent with the sovereignty of the UK", claiming it offered no means for the UK to unilaterally exit and no say for the people of Northern Ireland over the rules that would apply there.
BBC political editor Laura Kuenssberg said the new offer from Mr Johnson included some new customs checks on the island of Ireland, and would leave Northern Ireland in a different relationship with the EU to the rest of the UK in some ways.
She said the plans were "based on the notion of consent", giving more powers to Northern Ireland's devolved Parliament - the Stormont Assembly - to shape its future relationship with the EU - despite the fact the assembly is approaching 1,000 days without sitting.
The proposals also suggest a time period for when the relationship between Northern Ireland and the EU could move on.
But the full and precise details of Mr Johnson's plan twill not be clear until after the prime minister's speech at conference.
Will the EU agree to the plans?
Speaking to BBC Radio 4's Today programme earlier, Mr Cleverly appeared to put the ball in the EU's court.
"We have been in negotiating for some while," he said. "The UK has been flexible, but a negotiation means both parties need to be flexible.
"What we need to see now is the EU be flexible - and if they can be pragmatic and flexible, we can leave with a deal on 31 October. But we are going to leave on 31 October whatever."
Irish Fine Gael senator Neale Richmond told Today that the PM's plans were a "big move" from the withdrawal agreement made by Theresa May.
Mr Richmond said, under the plan, Northern Ireland would leave the customs union and "come out of the single market in all areas, apart from agri-food products and industrial products, and indeed it only stays in those areas for four years".
This, he added, would require "additional checks" on the island of Ireland - something he described as "extremely disappointing".
Laura Kuenssberg said there was a "real expectation and belief" in No 10 that "this is now the crunch point".
She said: "This is the moment…where the EU will have to respond and say [either] there is something that is a basis of a deal here, or not.
"And what Boris Johnson is trying to suggest is if the answer is not, then for him, that means no-deal."
The EU needs to see the precise details of Boris Johnson's proposals, but the direction of travel that has been coming through is different.
The very idea of customs check between Ireland and Northern Ireland, the promise of the use of technologies to ease the process that haven't yet been tried and tested, or don't even exist yet…that is a big no-no for the EU.
The bloc will look at the proposals carefully. They need to try as they do want a deal, and also they need to be seen to be trying.
But it is fundamentally misunderstanding the EU if the prime minister thinks at this stage the 26 EU leaders will turn round on the Irish prime minister and say: "Listen, you are going to have to accept this because we just want to have a deal."
It is also fundamentally misunderstanding the German Chancellor Angela Merkel, her attachment to EU unity and the integrity of the single market.
And also it is misunderstanding that the EU sees this in a bigger picture. If suddenly now they were to back down to all of the prime minister's demands how would that look to other trade partners across the globe.
So EU leaders will be very careful not to rubbish the prime minister's ideas, to talk about them as a basis for an agreement, but if it is take it or leave it, they will be leaving at this point.
Will MPs agree?
BBC assistant political editor Norman Smith said it was particularly important Mr Johnson secured the support of the Democratic Unionist Party's 10 MPs.
He said: "I think it is very clear this deal is not going to fly unless Boris Johnson can bring the DUP along with him... one way or another he has to make sure they're on board."
BBC Northern Ireland political editor Mark Devenport said sources from the DUP were supportive of the proposals and had been kept informed during their development.
However, the party's leader, Arlene Foster, declined to say whether she had seen the PM's proposals.
She told the BBC: "What we are doing with this prime minister is working very closely with him and we will continue to work closely with him over the next couple of hours and days.
"I hope we do get a deal that is acceptable to the European Union and one that is good for the whole of the United Kingdom."
Media playback is unsupported on your device
What is Mr Johnson going to say at conference?
Speaking in Manchester, Mr Johnson will suggest voters are "desperate" for the country to focus on other priorities and will contrast his determination to leave on 31 October with the "years of uncertainty" that he says would result from a Labour government promising another referendum.
"What people want, what Leavers want, what Remainers want, what the whole world wants - is to move on," he is expected to say.
"I am afraid that after three-and-a-half years people are beginning to feel that they are being taken for fools.
"They are beginning to suspect that there are forces in this country that simply don't want Brexit delivered at all.
"And if they turn out to be right in that suspicion then I believe there will be grave consequences for trust in democracy.
"Let's get Brexit done on October 31 so in 2020 our country can move on."
Mr Johnson's conference speech is set to clash with Prime Minister's Questions, which is taking place at 12.00 BST.
Normally the Commons goes into recess for the Tory conference, but MPs voted against this amid the bitter fallout from the government's unlawful prorogation of Parliament.
HONG KONG — Raw anger was building in Hong Kong on Wednesday over the shooting of a teenage demonstrator a day earlier, the first such incident since antigovernment demonstrations began in the territory nearly four months ago.
The question now is whether the shooting will further incite a protest movement that was already seething with grievances, and which has been driven by young people who see the city’s pro-Beijing leaders as illegitimate.
In an early sign of anger over the shooting, a Wednesday morning meeting between administrators at the teenager’s high school and more than 100 of its alumni quickly devolved into a bitter confrontation. Many of the former students cried, shouted questions and asked why the administrators had not condemned the police officer who shot the student.
“Can you see how many people are crying here?” one woman pleaded.
But others suggested the school take action against the student for his conduct in the protests, including Leung Chun-ying, Hong Kong’s former chief executive.
The Hong Kong Police Force said on Tuesday evening that the protester was an 18-year-old who had been shot in the left shoulder, and that he was conscious as he was taken to the hospital for surgery.
Image
Left, a protester in Hong Kong on Tuesday seen minutes before he was shot by a police officer. Right, the same protester just after being shot.CreditJasmine Leung/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images; The Hong Kong Polytechnic University Students' Union
In a video circulating online that appears to show the shooting, the protester is first seen joining a mob of black-clad people who chase a riot officer and tackle him to the ground. They kick him and beat him with what appear to be pipes.
A few seconds later, the protester approaches a second police officer who is nearby with a handgun drawn. Just after the protester hits the officer with the pole, the officer fires at the man at point-blank range.
Hours after the shooting, the Hong Kong police commissioner, Stephen Lo, said the officer who shot the protester had acted in a “legal and reasonable” manner, having given a verbal warning before opening fire.
The officer had been assaulted at close quarters, Mr. Lo said, and had no other choice but to shoot. “The range was not determined by the police officer, but by the perpetrator,” he said.
But the Hong Kong Public Doctors’ Association, which represents doctors working in public hospitals and medical departments at the University of Hong Kong, condemned the officer on Tuesday for not using a less powerful weapon, such as a rifle that shoots beanbag rounds, to subdue the protester.
In a statement on Wednesday morning, the protester’s high school, Tsuen Wan Public Ho Chuen Yiu Memorial College, said that faculty members and the student body “all feel very sad and worried” about the shooting. The school’s administration had opened a crisis management unit that includes psychologists and social workers to help students cope, the statement said.
Mr. Lo, the police commissioner, told reporters at an overnight news conference that the police had arrested the protester who was shot, but that the force would decide later whether to press charges. At the meeting with the alumni on Wednesday, the school's principal and vice principal said that the student would not be punished and would keep his place in the school.
The principal, Tse Yun Ming, lowered his gaze as he absorbed an onslaught of criticism from the former students.
“My emotions are also fluctuating,” he told them at one point.
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Students stand outside the Tsuen Wan Public Ho Chuen Yiu Memorial College during a demonstration held to show solidarity with the injured student, on Wednesday.CreditJerome Favre/EPA, via Shutterstock
But Mr. Leung, the city’s former chief executive, criticized the student’s conduct. “Could you not directly denounce his wrongdoing,” he asked in a Facebook post, suggesting that before being shot the student “surrounded and beat the police on the streets in full gear along with other rioters.”
Sit-in protests were expected Wednesday afternoon in at least seven Hong Kong districts, including in Tsuen Wan, where the shooting occurred. Tsuen Wan is a working-class district miles from the gleaming skyscrapers of the city’s financial district.
LONDON — When Boris Johnson takes the stage Wednesday at the Conservative Party Conference, an annual get-together at which activists and lawmakers debate policy, chitchat and buy memorabilia, he will stand in front of banners proclaiming a three-word policy: “Get Brexit Done.”
He may wish it was that simple.
With the Brexit deadline set for Oct. 31, it’s still unclear whether the United Kingdom will leave the European Union on time, or at all. The seemingly never-ending divorce has become mired in furious debate and legal battles.
Oct. 2, 201900:35
All of which means the U.K. is highly likely to face an election, and soon.
U.K. elections are supposed to happen every five years but Johnson can call for one at any point — as long as two-thirds of lawmakers in the House of Commons vote in favor.
Johnson has already failed to trigger an election several times, but one could also take place if the prime minister loses a vote of confidence, which has long been threatened by opposition members of Parliament.
It’s set to be a turbulent and fractious occasion in which the prime minister pitches himself against Parliament and lawmakers who would “surrender” to the E.U. as U.K. politics continues to borrow tactics and tone from President Donald Trump.
The Brexit debate illustrates how U.K. politics continues to ape the partisan nature of U.S. politics and the aggressive sloganeering of President Donald Trump, according to Simon Usherwood, a politics professor at the University of Surrey.
Sept. 25, 201901:54
“It’s not just Trump, it feels a very American style, the way the debate has been over the past decade or more, with echoes of culture wars and people being entrenched deep in their bubbles and speaking to their base rather than reaching out,” he said.
“Trump’s willingness to shout down opponents and question their motives and accuracy and everything else about them — I don’t think we’ve quite got to that stage, but the happiness of No. 10 to just keep on arguing [with their rivals] I think is quite striking,” he said, using shorthand to describe the prime minister’s official residence.
At the moment, Johnson’s government is achieving very little.
The prime minister attempted to suspend Parliament for five weeks, only for the U.K.’s highest court to rule he had done so illegally, misleading the Queen in the process.
And he may not be able to make Brexit happen at all, at least not this year: Parliament has already passed a law forcing Johnson to ask the E.U. for a third extension to the Brexit process, keeping the U.K. inside the bloc until at least Jan. 31.
To the dismay of lawmakers who accuse him of using inflammatory language, Johnson calls the law a “surrender bill” as it removes the threat of a “no-deal” Brexit in which the country leaves without a divorce deal, something Brexiteers see as key to forcing concessions from the E.U.
In a fiery debate last week in the House of Commons, Johnson was condemned by lawmakers for his incendiary language, such as repeatedly accusing lawmakers of “sabotaging” the U.K.’s exit from the E.U.
A visibly upset Labour lawmaker, Paula Sherriff, told Johnson: "We're subject to death threats and abuse every single day. And let me tell the prime minister that they often quote his words: 'surrender act,' 'betrayal,' 'traitor.'"
Johnson dismissed her out of hand.
"I've never heard such humbug in all my life," he said, essentially accusing Sherriff of being deceptive.
Johnson also brushed away reminders that lawmaker Jo Cox was stabbed and shot to death a week before the 2016 Brexit referendum by a far-right attacker shouting "Death to traitors!"
“The people outside this house understand what is happening,” he said. “The leader of the opposition and his party don’t trust the people.”
The Scottish National Party legislator Joanna Cherry, whose legal challenge in the Supreme Court ended Johson’s suspension of Parliament, said the House of Commons had been “treated to the sort of populist rant one expects to hear from a tin-pot dictatorship.”
John Bercow, the Commons speaker, who will step down later this year, said the atmosphere during the debate was “worse than any I've known in my 22 years in the House.”
None of these admonitions appear to have had an effect on Johnson, who is intent on delivering Brexit to his Conservative Party base.
But as he has no majority in the House of Commons, meaning he can’t force through any new laws or change old ones — that also means he can’t currently get a Brexit bill through Parliament, a necessary step before the U.K. leaves.
A second Brexit referendum at this point seems unlikely, so the road ahead leads to an election. But it’s laden with risk.
“The danger in the Conservatives choosing that option [a people versus Parliament election] is it’s been flagged well in advance so it gives opponents more time to think of ways to counteract it or take the edge off,” Usherwood said.
“There’s this assumption there’s this big master plan, a big diagram somewhere in No. 10, but it doesn’t really have the feel of this is how it was supposed to be. That doesn’t look like a master plan. It looks a bit more improvised and panicky.”
A 1950 poster for the Ulster Unionist Party.The Conservative Party Archive / Getty Images file
In previous elections, Britain has seen the Conservative Party going head-to-head with the opposition Labour Party — a classic left-versus-right battle pitching a strong privately-owned economy against state intervention and higher spending.
Voters may next head to the polls with Johnson’s strident anti-establishment messaging about Brexit ringing loudest in their ears.
This isn’t the first time an election has been focused on the popular will versus elected officials.
“The language of the people against the government has quite a long history in our politics,” James Freeman, an expert in British political history, said.
“It’s not just the Labour Party attacking the government, or Johnson attacking Labour, it’s more about Parliament as an institution blocking Brexit,” he said.
“This idea that it’s a ‘Remainer Parliament,’ that’s new,” he added, referring to those who wanted to remain in the European Union.
As for the influence of Trump, Freeman pointed out that the phrase “Make Britain Great Again” was used by the Conservative Party as an election slogan more than once in the 20th century.
“Some of the people around [Johnson] are very familiar with why they think Trump has been successful, and probably there’s some crossover because Brexit happened before Trump got elected,” he said.
“National revival is a consistent theme in our politics, particularly on the Conservative side.”
It remains to be seen whether Johnson will find a way to make Brexit happen — but the effect of Brexit on any forthcoming election, and British politics and society at large, is inescapable.
