After two months of combined Occupy and student protests in central Hong Kong, the central government has begun clearing tent cities. The move has sparked new pockets of violence.

A scuffle broke out between police and a small group of protesters who were trying to break into the city’s legislature, Wednesday. 

Six protesters were detained in the early hours of the morning before publicly warning of more arrests.

Police are beginning to clear the protesters' tent-cities in Hong Kong (Citobun/Wikicommons)

The owners of the CITIC Tower had taken out an injunction to unblock the entrance to the building on the edge of the main protest site.

The student activists appear to be fighting a losing battle. After the initial force which garnered worldwide attention, the government in Hong Kong has adopted the tactic of standing by in the hope that the protests will lose momentum.

This strategy is working.

READ MORE: What's next for Hong Kong?

The CITIC injunction demonstrates Hongkongers’ famed business-friendly attitude, and polls are beginning to reflect the plunging popularity of the disruptive protests.

A poll released Sunday by the Chinese University of Hong Kong shows that during the month of October, public support for the occupying protesters dropped from 37.8 percent to 33.9 percent. Opposition rose from 35.5 percent to 43.5 percent.

Two-thirds of Hongkongers surveyed said that protesters should pack up and leave their campsites.

While the protests initially drew tens of thousands, the BBC reports that numbers have dwindled to a few hundred. 

These new clashes have served only to highlight the intransigence of the Chinese central government on the issue of Hong Kong’s autonomy.

Protests - which have now gone on for more than 50 days - initially began when Beijing made clear that the planned Chief Executive elections in 2017 would use the promised universal suffrage system but only with a list of candidates approved by Xi Jinping’s  government.

The “one country, two systems” concept was enshrined in the agreement between the United Kingdom and China when sovereignty of Hong Kong was handed over in 1997.

In these latest clashes though, protest leaders have distanced themselves from the splinter group who used stones and metal barricades to try and break into the executive building.

READ MORE: USC protests Hong Kong violence.

A spokesperson from Occupy Central told the Washington Post that those responsible for the violence had misled their followers by claiming that the legislature had signed a bill limiting internet freedom. In reality, the bill is still in discussion.

Protesters outside the Hong Kong government building. (wing1990HK/Wikicommons)

This outpouring of frustration comes in the weeks after October’s anticlimactic television debate between Hong Kong leaders and five students, which failed to achieve any real change.

Further court orders for site-clearing have been requested by businesses in the nearby Mong Kok neighborhood. The South China Morning Post says that hundreds of police are on stand-by to clear the district as early as Thursday. 

The same goes for companies on Harcourt Road which runs through the heart of the main encampment.

If and when those injunctions are granted, it could signal a final clash between protesters and police.

The New York Times suggests that protesters are beginning to discuss how to end protests.

Read more at the Washington Post.

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