The "Occupy Central" campaigners Benny Tai and Joshua Wong are featured on Foreign Policy's list of "leading global thinkers of 2014", for "making Beijing sweat". Such gloss is only one of example to show how the US-led West is behind the "umbrella movement". Early on Wednesday, after a period of calm, a small group of protesters even broke into the city's legislature.

In fact, whatever the grievances of the largely middle-class demonstrators, there is incontrovertible evidence of involvement by US funded agencies, and former officials in meetings, trainings, financing, and other matters leading up to the demonstrations.

Benny Tai, frequently mentioned as the key "democracy" organizer in Hong Kong, regularly attends forums paid for or organized by the US State Department, National Endowment for Democracy and its subsidiary the National Democratic Institute.

The NED and NDI, despite having "democracy" and "democratic" in their names, are far from democratic. The NED was founded, in the words of its first head, "to carry out the work the CIA" - the US spy service - "could no longer do". Both NED and its sister organization the NDI are primarily funded by the US Congress.

Their real mission is to destabilize and overturn independent governments which are not to the liking of US policymakers, whether by supporting agitation for "freer elections" as in Hong Kong, or by overturning elected governments, as was done recently in Ukraine with Viktor Yanukovych's government.

However, the connections of the NED and NDI to the Hong Kong "pro-democracy" movement are more than just those to Benny Tai. Some other "key leaders" are also involved.

The emergence of China, Russia or any other nation as a stable and significantly influential nation in world affairs is clearly opposed by the Paul Wolfowitz doctrine that the US must remain the sole super power.

It is significant, and disturbing, that just two months before the latest round of Hong Kong demonstrations the author of this anti-democratic doctrine was meeting with a leader of the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong.

Other interventions in Hong Kong affairs by US government entities have included, as stated on the NDI's own website, an NDI sponsored "six-month young political leaders program", a "campaign school for candidates and campaign managers in the lead-up to the 2007 (Hong Kong) elections", and an NDI-supported conference with "panelists from across the political spectrum" which explored "adopting a system of coalition government".

Let's dwell for a moment on the preceding points. The NDI and NED, US government organs, have been doing things like sponsoring training for "young political leaders", operating a "campaign school for candidates and campaign managers", holding high level meetings with organizers of political street demonstrations, and funding political organizations, not in their own country, not in the US, but in China.

How would the US government, media, and citizens respond if Chinese government agencies were sponsoring conferences inside the US on how to change the US political system, or organized political training camps for US youth, or if Chinese officials were holding frequent meetings with the organizers of Occupy Wall Street?

The author is a Canadian freelance writer.

(China Daily USA 11/21/2014 page16)