China's number three official, Zhang Dejiang, says Beijing is aware of problems in Hong Kong, but will respect the city's autonomy, as protesters hit the streets to oppose Chinese attempts to squeeze local freedoms.
Zhang's comments were made during a visit to Hong Kong that comes at a time of mounting political tensions, and is the first by a senior state leader since tens of thousands of people mounted a massive, but ultimately unsuccessful push to pressure Beijing to grant full democracy during the 'Occupy Central' street protests in late 2014.
Thousands of police were deployed across the city on Wednesday, preventing protesters from coming near Zhang as he toured a science park and a harbour-front exhibition centre where he addressed an economic summit.
"The argument that the Central Government is trying to turn Hong Kong into mainland (China), or to turn 'one country, two systems' into 'one country, one system' is totally baseless," Zhang said in unusually direct comments from a state leader on recent challenges and tensions in Hong Kong.
Zhang also addressed the trend of more radical activists forming political groupings and staging disruptive protests to call for greater Hong Kong nationalism and even independence from China - an issue that might become more mainstream when city-wide legislative council elections are held in September.
Zhang conceded that a small minority of people in Hong Kong had been calling for independence, but said China would "unswervingly" maintain the current "one country, two systems" model of governance that guarantees a high degree of autonomy in Hong Kong since it switched from British to Chinese rule in 1997.
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