The United States is carefully calibrating its response to pro-democracy demonstrations in Hong Kong, showing support for peaceful protests while signaling it has little interest in seeing the situation escalate and risk a harsher crackdown by Chinese authorities.
Saying it was closely monitoring the political unrest unfolding on the streets of Hong Kong, the White House on Monday urged security forces there to "exercise restraint" and also called on protesters to "express their views peacefully."
But it could be a tricky balancing act for Washington, especially given Beijing's transformation into a global economic powerhouse and given how inter-dependent the U.S. and Chinese economies have become since the Tiananmen Square crackdown 25 years ago.