Hong Kong's leader says despite leaked comments, she never offered to quit over protests

Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam said Tuesday she has never actually considered resigning over the protests that have roiled the city over the summer, clarifying leaked comments she made last week to business leaders. In a 24-minute recording of her speech, obtained by Reuters and released Monday, Lam said that "for a chief executive to have caused this huge havoc to Hong Kong is unforgivable. It’s just unforgivable. If I have a choice, the first thing is to quit, having made a deep apology, is to step down."

Lam did not dispute the authenticity of the leaked recording, saying only that it's "totally unacceptable" someone secretly recorded her private comments. But she did tell reporters Tuesday that quitting was "an easy path" she won't take. "I have never tendered a resignation to the central people's government. I have not even contemplated to discuss a resignation," Lam said, adding that "the choice of not resigning was my own choice," not Beijing's.

In her leaked comments, Lam also said Beijing isn't preparing to send in the army to quell Hong Kong's persistent protests, but her own ability to defuse the protests is constrained by the central government now viewing the situation as a national sovereignty and security issue, especially amid the trade war with the U.S. In such a situation, she said, "the political room for the chief executive who, unfortunately, has to serve two masters by constitution — that is, the central people's government and the people of Hong Kong — that political room for maneuvering is very, very, very limited." Read the entire transcript at Reuters.

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