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HONG KONG MEDIA are reporting that China has approved a contentious law that would allow authorities to crack down on subversive and secessionist activity.
The South China Morning Post newspaper and public broadcaster RTHK, both citing unnamed sources, said that the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress voted unanimously to approve a national security law for Hong Kong today.
There was no official confirmation from the central government in Beijing or Hong Kong officials.
Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam declined to comment on the law at a weekly meeting with reporters, saying it was inappropriate for her to do so while the Standing Committee was still meeting.
She did say that once the law is passed, “the Hong Kong government will announce it and promulgate it for implementation here, and then I and my senior officials will do our best to respond to everyone’s questions, especially regarding the enforcement of this national law.”
The legislation is aimed at curbing subversive, secessionist and terrorist activities, as well as foreign intervention in the city’s affairs.
It follows months of anti-government protests that at times descended into violence in Hong Kong last year.
The law has met with strong opposition within Hong Kong and condemnation from former colonial ruler Britain, the US, the European Union and others.
Human rights groups have warned the law could target opposition politicians seen as insufficiently loyal to Beijing for arrest or disqualification from running in September elections for the Legislative Council.
Ahead of the announcement, the US government said yesterday it will bar defence exports to Hong Kong and will soon require licenses for the sale of items to Hong Kong that have both civilian and military uses.
The administration has warned for weeks that if the law was passed, it would take action to end special US trade and commercial preferences Hong Kong had enjoyed since reverting to Chinese rule in 1997.
“The United States is forced to take this action to protect US national security,” Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a statement.
“We can no longer distinguish between the export of controlled items to Hong Kong or to mainland China. We cannot risk these items falling into the hands of the People’s Liberation Army, whose primary purpose is to uphold the dictatorship of the (ruling Communist Party) by any means necessary.”
The US Senate on Thursday unanimously approved a bill to impose sanctions on businesses and individuals — including the police — that undermine Hong Kong’s autonomy or restrict freedoms promised to the city’s residents.
Britain says it could offer residency and possible citizenship to around 3 million of Hong Kong’s 7.5 million people.
China has denounced all such moves as gross interference in its internal affairs and foreign ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian on Monday said Beijing has decided to retaliate with visa restrictions on “US personnel who perform badly on Hong Kong related issues”.
China decided to use the National People’s Congress to enact the legislation after opposition within Hong Kong’s Legislative Council and within society as a whole made it impossible to pass at the local level.
The law is seen as the most significant erosion to date of Hong Kong’s British-style rule of law and high degree of autonomy that China promised Hong Kong would enjoy at least through 2047 under the “one country, two systems” framework.
Passage of the legislation will also allow the central government in Beijing to set up a national security office in Hong Kong to collect and analyse intelligence and deal with criminal cases related to national security.
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“allow authorities to crack down on subversive and secessionist activity”
Wow, that’s some seriously concerning language to use to describe pro-democracy, pro-civil-rights protestors who have been largely peaceful. They’re standing up for the independence of Hong Kong, and the journal labels it as “subversive”?
And to call it *secessionist*?? Hong Kong is *not* part of China, disgusting to see those words being used to describe these protestors.
@David Bourke: that’s the Government words…that’s what the law says…the Journal are just reporting.
@Canyon:
Well perhaps the journal shouldn’t be opening an article with Chinese propaganda. They could write “what it calls subversive and secessionist activity” or “what they classify as subversive and secessionist activity”.
Repeating Chinese propaganda isn’t an excuse.
That’s the left for ya,
@Jimmy Carroll: Communists are as much left as fascists are right.
@Jimmy Carroll: The Chinese government is neither left or communist. They are authoritarian. Take your broad brush generalisations elsewhere.
“Britain says it could offer residency and possible citizenship to around 3 million of Hong Kong’s 7.5 million people.” Wait till the Brexiteers hear about this!
@Emma Meehan: we are in line to take them in too
@Emma Meehan: brexiteers would welcome them
@DukeZacharyV: Because brexiters are not to bright. They think that all in Hong Kong are rich self-sufficient bankers. 3 milion people would make an anonymous impact on UK services and housing market. Have you forgotten how larger Germany struggled to deal with 1 milon syrian refugees few years ago. With 3 milion refugees from Hong Kong UK would implode. …. Maybe it’s good they are leaving the EU.
The CCP is a plague – very worrying times.
@Conor: pew independent polling shows they are more popular in their country than any Western government… And the Chinese are people who have waged wars against their rulers before.
@SC:
If a man with a clipboard comes and asks you “what do you think of the government” in China, do you really think you’ll feel free to say “I don’t like them, they’re corrupt and they should go”?
This is a country where thousands of people disappear, where you have a “social score” that decides if you can travel, get a loan, rent a home, borrow a car, get certain jobs, etc.
Anyway, we’re not talking about what the Chinese think of the CCP, we’re talking about a different country, HONG KONG!
The CCP is an ethnofascist regime, they aim to take over many countries around south east asia. What the Chinese think of this is irrelevant, they have no right to Taiwan or Hong Kong, or the south pacific islands, just like the Germans had no right to Poland or the Czech Republic.
@SC: I have lived in HK 15 years. When you go to China, ALL media is controlled by the CCP state. ALL information provided to the populace demonize the west and its values. The population of china now, mostly know nothing of politics or free speech that’s outside china. It complete systematic brainwashing. So as much as the poll is independent, the people are brainwashed and fear speaking against the state. Self censorship. A chinese person living in Dalian or Yunnan knows nothing of what happens in HK or elsewhere. New law means arrest for anything they choose, detained indefinitely without trial, detained in secret location. Transfer to China if local law does not suit CCP political result where death penalty can be applied. They want retrospective application even noby has seen the law.
@SC: “Standing Committee… voted unanimously” – imagine that, not one person with a different view.
I think the British solution is best. Britain takes whoever in Hong Kong wants to live in Britain and the ones who want to stay in China stay in China.
@SC:
And what about those who want to live in their home of Hong Kong? China has no right to Hong Kong.
@David Bourke: they can live in the real deal England instead of British colony. There’ll be no Poles to clean toilets and pick veg after Brexit.
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