Nine arrested in Hong Kong for alleged homemade bomb threat, as tensions with China increase

Nine people were arrested Tuesday in Hong Kong for allegedly plotting to detonate homemade bombs in courts and elsewhere throughout the city, amid increasing efforts by China’s ruling communist party to crack down on dissent.

Those arrested include six secondary school students, and the alleged targets also include tunnels and trash cans, according to the Associated Press. 

The arrested were detained on suspicion of engaging in terrorist activity, under a strict national security law imposed last year amid pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong, a China territory that until recently had governed with considerable autonomy.

The ruling Chinese Communist Party and Hong Kong authorities have used the law to arrest many of the city’s prominent activists. Earlier this summer, several raids on the pro-democracy newspaper Apple Daily forced its shutdown. 

Police said the group arrested Tuesday was attempting to make the explosive triacetone triperoxide, or TATP, which has been widely used in bombings in Europe and elsewhere, in a makeshift laboratory in a hostel.

Those arrested were 15 to 39 years old, said Senior Superintendent Li Kwai-wah of the Hong Kong Police National Security Department, the wire service also reports.