TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – Japan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Wednesday (Aug. 14) issued a travel warning for Hong Kong for the first time since the city's 1997 sovereignty transfer from the UK to China, NHK reports.

Amid the ongoing protests and increasingly violent police crackdown, Japan raised the travel alert level for all of the territories of Hong Kong from Level 0 (safe) to Level 1 (cautious), with Level 4 (evacuation advisory) being the highest on the scale. The warning took effect on Thursday (Aug. 15).

The notice warned Japanese citizens that clashes between the protesters and the police have spread to the airport, metro stations, and shopping malls. It also mentioned that there have been white-shirted gangsters indiscriminately attacking people on the streets and that emergency services in Hong Kong may not be able to respond.