Foreign Experts To Publish Own Report Into Policing

One of the five experts who was hired by the Independent Police Complaints Council (IPCC) to advise on its study into the social unrest last year said they planned to produce their own report on the handling of the unrest by the Hong Kong police.

Clifford Stott said on Sunday that the experts hope to publish it on or before June 9, exactly one year after an estimated one million people took to the streets in the first major protest against the now-withdrawn extradition bill.

The expert from Keele University was originally hired by the IPCC as one of the members on an international panel to advise the watchdog looking into some of the major events and controversial incidents of the unrest.

But the members quit in December, saying they felt the IPCC didn't have enough powers, capacity or independent investigative capability.

And while the IPCC finally published its report on Friday, which dismissed many of the key allegations against the force, the experts decided to take the matter into their own hands by issuing a separate paper.

Announcing in a tweet, Stott said they will utilise the data in the IPCC report, as well as their own, to analyse the evolution of the protest movement.

The social psychology professor added that the paper will "discuss the inter-relationships between the policing and behavioural patterns of 2019 protests in Hong Kong".

Professor Stott said they will draw upon primary and secondary data, including interviews with protest participants, and divided the events from June to September 2019 in at least three phases.

Among the key events to be covered are the storming of Legco by protesters on July 1 and the attack by white-shirted men by train passengers at Yuen Long MTR station on July 21.

The professor criticised the IPCC report released last Friday, saying it lacks key data, and an independent inquiry is needed to allay public concern about the force's conduct.

The police watchdog, meanwhile, continues to defend its report.

Chairman of the IPCC's publicity and survey committee, Clement Chan, who attended RTHK's City Forum on Sunday, brushed aside suggestions the report is biased towards the force.

"Well, let's call a spade a spade," Chan said.

"If you are looking for some sort of criticism, room for improvement for police conduct during that period, definitely we noted some of them and therefore, you know, we came up with the 52 recommendations that we did in the report."

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