Communist Party leaders said they would bring in “national security” legal measures to quell unrest in the territory. The pitfalls could catch them out.

1. BEIJING — Beijing urged Hong Kong’s embattled leader on Wednesday to support a push to impose national security measures in the territory, which has been hit by months of antigovernment protests. The trouble is that what China’s ruling Communist Party has proposed is not clear and could be hard to enforce.

2. The party hopes that such national security measures will head off unrest in Hong Kong that has challenged its authority. But Hong Kong’s politicians have little appetite for security legislation that could set off more intense protests. Many experts also doubt how much Beijing can directly impose its will on the territory’s legal system without dangerously damaging trust in Hong Kong’s special status both there and internationally.

3. China’s latest warning to end the protests that have pummeled Hong Kong for 22 weeks was delivered by Han Zheng, a vice premier who oversees Chinese policy toward the territory, when he met Carrie Lam, Hong Kong’s top official, in Beijing on Wednesday.

4. “This extreme violence and destruction would not be tolerated or accepted by any country or society in the world,” Mr. Han told Mrs. Lam, according to footage of the meeting shown by Phoenix, a Hong Kong-based television service.