It's about 11 o'clock on Sunday evening on we're witnessing and demonstration that the organizer's say is involving about 1.7 million people.

This makes this one of the biggest demonstrations that we've seen since the cycle of protests here began about 10 weeks ago.

But the unusual thing about tonight is that this has been an entirely peaceful protest.

We've seen no evidence off tear gas.

No evidence of clashes between protesters and police on this also represents a show of defiance against Beijing, because in recent days China has been ramping up the rhetoric against Hong Kong.

It's been showing videos of troop movements on the mainland border with Hong Kong on criticizing the demonstrators here as terrorists on rioters and saying that they lack a sense of patriotism.

The other aspect about tonight's demonstration is that this is officially illegal.

The authorities in Hong Kong had said the demonstrators could collect in Victoria Park, but they said that these roads in the center of Hong Kong would remain off limits to demonstrators On DSO.

It is been surprising that we haven't seen any evidence of police moving in here to clear away the crowds.

This, I think, puts pressure on Beijing to try to find a new way to end what appears to be an intractable standoff now between the demonstrators in Hong Kong on the will of the mandarins in Beijing.