Twitter suspends hundreds of accounts linked to covert Chinese influence campaign against Hong Kong protesters

Twitter has suspended thousands of accounts which it believes to be part of a covert Chinese government campaign designed to "undermine the legitimacy" of Hong Kong's protest movement.

The social network said it had "reliable evidence" that 936 accounts which had been tweeting about the protests were part of a "coordinated state-backed operation".

Their purpose, it said, was to "sow political discord" in the territory and to "undermine the legitimacy and political positions" of the pro-democracy protesters who have brought one of the world's major financial centres to a standstill.

The company also suspended an additional 200,000 accounts before they became active, many of them created just after the other accounts were deleted.

The protests, now in their third month, are facing an intense crackdown by the Chinese government, which took over Hong Kong from the UK in 1997, as well as a propaganda blitz from state-run media.

"Covert, manipulative behaviors have no place on our service — they violate the fundamental principles on which our company is built," said Twitter in a statement.

"As we have said before, it is clear that information operations and coordinated inauthentic behavior will not cease. These deceptive strategies... adapt and change as the geopolitical terrain evolves worldwide and as new technologies emerge.

We will continue to be vigilant, learning from this network and proactively enforcing our policies to serve the public conversation."

This story is developing. Watch out for more updates soon.