Police reputation and morale at stake in Hong Kong protests

Hong Kong police have been pushed and pulled in all directions during weeks of pro-democracy street protests, obeying orders to clear protest sites, allow protest sites to stay put, push back demonstrators and protect them from attack.

With no end to the standoff in sight, the police, long known as ‘Asia’s finest’, risk being cast as enforcers for an unpopular central government in Beijing or failing in their duty to ensure the city remains one of the safest in the world.

‘Your friendly ‘bobby on the beat’ image ... has been taken for granted in Hong Kong,’ said Steve Tsang, head of the School of Contemporary Chinese Studies at the University of Nottingham in England.‘If the police start actually using force then all those things that have been built up ... will go out of the window.’In signs of goodwill, police have been seen washing out protesters’ eyes with bottled water after using pepper spray.