Carrie Lam

Activist Joshua Wong, who has become the face of Hong Kong's push for full democracy, walked free from prison on June 17 and vowed to join a mass protest movement demanding that the city's Beijing-backed leader, Carrie Lam, steps down.

Chinese President Xi Jinping stood bolt upright and impassive on Friday as he inspected more than 3,000 People’s Liberation Army (PLA) troops in Hong Kong, the largest military parade in the city since its handover to China in 1997.

Hong Kong leader-elect Carrie Lam said on April 11 there is no room for moves towards independence in the former British colony which she said needs the support of the central government in Beijing to boost economic development over the next five years. 

A Beijing-backed civil servant, Carrie Lam, was chosen to be Hong Kong's next leader on March 26 amid accusations that Beijing is meddling and denying the financial hub a more populist leader perhaps better able to defuse political tension.

Hong Kong's tough pro-Beijing number two Carrie Lam announced her bid to lead the deeply divided city on Jan. 12 after stepping down from her current post.  

Lam is deputy to Hong Kong's unpopular leader Leung Chun-ying and rose through the ranks as a career civil servant before taking public office.