China sets up Hong Kong crisis center.....>

HONG KONG: China sets up Hong Kong crisis center in mainland, considers

replacing chief liaison (RTRS)

- Tightening control over efforts to manage the upheaval in Hong Kong, the

Chinese leadership has set up a crisis command center on the mainland side of

the border and is considering replacing its official liaison to the restive

semi-autonomous city, people familiar with the matter said. As violent protests

roil Hong Kong, top Chinese leaders in recent months have been managing their

response from a villa on the outskirts of Shenzhen, bypassing the formal

bureaucracy through which Beijing has supervised the financial hub for two

decades. Ordinarily, communications between Beijing and Hong Kong are conducted

through a Chinese government body: the Liaison Office of the Central People's

Government in Hong Kong. The Liaison Office is housed in a Hong Kong skyscraper

stacked with surveillance cameras, ringed by steel barricades and topped by a

reinforced glass globe.