Thousands of protesters took to the street in Hong Kong as clashes broke out once again on Tuesday, a day after a strike in the former British colony was marred by violence that left a total 128 people injured and led to more than 260 being arrested.

According to the city’s hospital authority, the total number of people injured on Monday’s protests included 93 men and 35 women.

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It also said that both a 21-year-old who was shot by a policeman and a 57-year-old man who was set on fire after an argument with protesters remained hospitalized in “critical condition”.

According to local media reports, some public transport services were again disrupted during rush hour on Tuesday morning, and clashes between riot police and protesters were resumed on some university campuses, where officers used tear gas.

Meanwhile, the city’s embattled leader Carrie Lam appeared at a press conference in which she accused the protesters of being “selfish” for continuing what she described as vandalism.

The Hong Kong leader, whose resignation the protesters have been calling for, among other demands, expressed gratitude to those not taking part in the strike and for citizens who voluntarily removed barricades erected by protesters in the streets.

Early on Monday, the US government condemned the violence witnessed during the anti-government protests in the city and called for both police and protestors alike to exercise restraint.

Hong Kong has been upended by five months of huge and increasingly violent rallies, but Beijing has refused to give in to most of the movement’s demands.

Tensions have soared in recent days following the death on Friday of a 22-year-old student Alex Chow, who succumbed to serious injuries sustained from a fall in the vicinity of a violent clash the weekend before.

The protests, which have been drawing massive crowds since June following a contentious proposed extradition law that has been pulled by the government, have mutated into a movement that seeks to improve the democratic mechanisms that govern Hong Kong and safeguard – or expand – the region’s partial autonomy from Beijing.

In 2018, the Hong Kong government had disqualified the candidacy of another pro-democracy activist, Agnes Chow, for the Legislative Council by-election in March of the same year due to her stance on advocating self-determination for the former British colony.