UK lawmakers urge sanctions over Hong Kong police violence

British lawmakers investigating rights violations by Hong Kong police have urged the U.K. government to sanction the city’s leader for allowing “excessive police violence” toward humanitarian workers helping those injured in pro-democracy protests.

Tuesday’s report from the bipartisan All Party Parliamentary Group on Hong Kong said first aid workers, as well as doctors and nurses, have been subjected to intimidation, threats, physical violence and arrests during months-long clashes between police and protesters that began in the city last year.

“The Hong Kong Police Force’s treatment of humanitarian aid workers and their interference within hospitals have resulted in injured protesters not receiving the required medical care in time or at all,” the report said.

Lawmaker Alistair Carmichael, who co-chairs the parliamentary group, said the violence was “not the actions of a few rogue officers” and was “clearly a systematic and quite deliberate” change that aligned more with policing in mainland China.

The report’s authors said they drew their conclusions after receiving over 1,000 pieces of written evidence and hearing many firsthand experiences from witnesses.

It called for Britain to urgently impose sanctions on Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam and the city’s police commissioner.

The semi-autonomous city has seen its most violent anti-government protests in the past year, as demonstrations against a proposed law that would allow suspects to be extradited to China grew into a much wider protest movement.

(Representative Image)