More than a dozen flights were cancelled Sunday as thousands of 'pro-democracy' activists blocked routes to Hong Kong's airport, a day after protesters and police fought pitched battles in some of the worst violence seen in the city since unrest began three months ago. At least 16 flights were cancelled, the airport's website said, with the departure hall packed with a backlog of passengers who had struggled to make it to the terminals.

Earlier, operators of the Airport Express train suspended services after the station was besieged, while black-clad protesters - hiding from CCTV cameras under umbrellas - built barricades at the bus terminus and attempted to stop traffic on the main road leading to the facility.

Stranded travellers were forced to abandon their lifts and drag their luggage along the airport road. Sunday's action is the latest in three months of increasingly violent protests sparked initially by opposition to a proposed law that would have allowed extraditions to mainland China, but which morphed into a broader anti-government movement.

Outside one airport terminal, protesters set off fire extinguishers, piled luggage trolleys into makeshift road barricades and smashed surveillance cameras before being driven away by police.

Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2019