It may be Christmas Eve but protesters in Hong Kong are still protesting and undercover police are still beating them with batons. In the second clip below you’ll see a group of people identified as undercover police arriving at the mall.

Undercover cops get into the shopping mall to cause different chaos. They are actually the source of violence and this is how they defame Hong Kong protests. None of the undercover cops will be arrested no matter how seriously they injured the citizens. #HKprotests #ChristmasEve pic.twitter.com/s7JRZBV8n5

— Laura. (@lauraandarual) December 24, 2019

At this same mall, police were pointing their weapons at everyone (2nd clip below):

Riot police pointing guns at heckling crowd in Harbour City pic.twitter.com/hZcpDbf5T5

— Xinqi Su 蘇昕琪 (@XinqiSu) December 24, 2019

One protester injured himself by jumping from the 2nd floor while trying to get away from police:

#HKPoliceBrutality #StandWithHongKong pic.twitter.com/P81qkBUVG8

— Shaf 😷 (@Lafourtuna) December 24, 2019

The police on their way out:

#BREAKING: Riot police pepper spray and point non lethal gun to protesters and spectators as they retreat from Langham Place#HongKongProtests pic.twitter.com/Nn45K07JqR

— Victor Ting (@VictorTing7) December 24, 2019

Outside the malls, police were firing teargas and rubber bullets:

The night before Christmas was marked with tear gas and rubber bullets as police tried to disperse protesters gathered near the city’s harbor front, signaling a renewed escalation in the conflict after a few weeks of relative calm.

Hundreds gathered in the tourist-heavy neighborhood of Tsim Tsa Tsui to chant “fight for Hong Kong” and “five demands.” Around 9 p.m., riot police fired several rounds of tear gas near the Peninsula hotel, a luxury British colonial-era establishment that has been hit hard by falling numbers of tourists as months of protests drive the city into recession. As people fled, one protester threw an object at police, prompting one officer to fire rubber bullets.

You can see some of that in this clip:

[2147 Tsim Sha Tsui]#ChristmasEve in Hong Kong = Rains of Tear Gas Canisters

Thanks for #HongKongPolice showing to the world a new definition of "Unlawful Assembly" – Ppl gathering & celebrating for Christmas.#HongKongProtests #HongKong
[h/t: AppleDaily] pic.twitter.com/NJ3tlvBntG

— 👁 WATCHING Y😷U (@thetimeusedtobe) December 24, 2019

Not sure where this took place but it appears the police are breaking in and then decide to leave:

Fully Masked, No #Police ID, No search warrant — these idk “#HKPolice” or #Robbers BREAKS INTO a locked private premise in #HongKong tonight. #Christmas in a Police State 🇭🇰#RuleOfLaw fails. pic.twitter.com/4MggYzkP4g

— @Dystopia – #StandWithHongKong (@Dystopia992) December 24, 2019

Protests have been going strong for six months now. Things had been relatively calm until yesterday when a protest in support of the Uighurs in Xinjiang turned violent.

One of the “five demands” that the protesters are calling for is an inquiry into the misconduct of the police. Today the Washington Post reports that, based on training materials, police are frequently violating their own rules without any consequences:

A review of more than 100 pages of police guidelines and training manuals obtained by The Washington Post details these protocols surrounding use of force. The guidelines, however, were often ignored by police, who have misused chemical agents and used excessive force against protesters not resisting, according to experts in policing who examined dozens of incidents in consultation with Post journalists and in comparison with the police protocols…

The contrast between the police tactics and the rules set down in the manuals — most of which have not been made public before — has potential importance in any resolution as protests spill into the new year…

A culture of impunity now pervades the force, according to a current and a former officer, emboldening riot police to disregard their training or lie when asked in official reports to justify excessive force.

“The commanders are too afraid to upset the front-line officers, so if their behavior is not too far away from the guidelines, then they’ll just close one eye and ignore it,” said a 27-year-old officer. The incidents captured on video represent a fraction of the wrongdoings, he said.

The whole article is worth reading and includes numerous specific examples of police using excessive force. Finally, here’s a video that is making the rounds. This is a police community relations officer explaining why the use of the term “cockroaches” to describe protesters isn’t necessarily a bad thing because cockroaches display “vitality.”

WATCH: Police community relations officer Tam Yu-hei explains why calling protesters cockroaches is actually a term of endearment pic.twitter.com/iQXFIQCSR5

— RTHK English News (@rthk_enews) December 23, 2019