between both the protesters and the police

over the past few days.

At around 8am this morning a police officer shot a protester

at close range in the stomach.

The protester is now in a critical condition.

We also saw a video go viral of a police officer

on a motorbike ploughing into protesters this morning.

And I think those two incidents combined

with the death of a student on Friday

brought a lot of office workers out onto the streets

today during their lunch break.

We saw riot police fire multiple rounds of tear gas

in central Hong Kong at people in office shirts.

It was really extraordinary to walk around central Hong Kong

today at lunchtime and speak to professionals and office

workers who were either on the front line...

I spoke to one accountant.

He said for the first time today he

decided to join the front line in his lunch break.

He said previously he was a moderate protester

but because of what happened on Friday with the first death

and how angry he is at the current situation

he felt like he needed to step up today.

He told me he was petrified of being arrested

and of the possible consequences.

And we also saw a lot of office workers loitering

by the front line, expressing support, chanting slogans.

So there seems to be a lot of anger right

now amongst not only the more radical front-line protesters,

but also moderate working professionals in Hong Kong.

So what's going to happen next is

we're expecting further escalation of violence

between the police and the protesters.

Hong Kong's chief executive, Carrie Lam,

just held a press conference where she labelled

the protesters the enemy of the people.

It's important to bear in mind that she currently

has the lowest approval ratings of any chief executive

in the history of Hong Kong.

And the latest polling shows that the vast majority

of Hong Kongers overwhelmingly blame her, the police,

and the Chinese central government

for the ongoing unrest in Hong Kong.

That doesn't bode well for the violence de-escalating

in Hong Kong.

We're seeing a very hard-line stance from mainland China.

Over the weekend, the central government released a statement

saying that the chief executive of Hong Kong and judges

and other people who work for the Hong Kong government all

need to be, quote, unquote, "patriots."

And they also said there needs to be implementation of Article

23, which are anti-sedition laws in Hong Kong, which

when previously floated saw enormous protests

on the streets of Hong Kong in 2003.