Hong Kong leader complains: Allowing democracy would let poor people dominate elections [View all]

[unhappycamper]

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/10/hong-kong-leader-complains-allowing-democracy-would-let-poor-people-dominate-elections/



A pro-democracy protester wearing a Guy Fawkes mask stands at a barricade during a stand-off with police in Hong Kong's Mong Kok district on Oct. 19, 2014.

Hong Kong leader complains: Allowing democracy would let poor people dominate elections
Agence France-Presse
20 Oct 2014 at 22:14 ET

Hong Kong’s Beijing-backed leader Leung Chun-ying told media that if the government met pro-democracy protesters’ demands it would result in the city’s poorer people dominating elections.

In an interview with foreign media, carried in the Wall Street Journal and International New York Times, the embattled chief executive reiterated his position that free elections were impossible.

Demonstrators have paralysed parts of Hong Kong with mass rallies and road blockades for more than three weeks, in one of the biggest challenges to Beijing’s authority since the Tiananmen pro-democracy protests of 1989.

Leung’s comments were published just hours before talks between senior government officials and student leaders to end the impasse are scheduled to take place later on Tuesday.