Your Hong Kong handover 25th anniversary metaphor du jour – a burning bridge collapses.
Some insider/expert views on the sinking of the Jumbo from TransitJam. Seems hardly any insurers would cover the barge’s trip over high seas – but scuttling would be a convenient and cost-effective way of just dumping the thing.
Will Xi Jinping be visiting Hong Kong for July 1? The sharp reduction in quarantine time for ‘elites’ slated to be in his presence raises suspicions he might not. Also, People’s Daily chooses this moment to remind us how greatly he cares for the city, which you may or may not think suggests he’ll cancel. More likely, he will turn up – but for a few hours at the most, and the ‘elites’ will not be allowed near him.
From Chris Patten – a pointed letter to the Times, and remarks on whether Hong Kong was a British colony…
“I’m delighted to be able to demonstrate that as the last governor of Hong Kong, that I do actually exist, that I’m not a figment of my imagination,” Patten said, referencing the proposed textbooks.
A quick Patten Q&A on ‘post-peak’ China’s ability to maintain Hong Kong as an international hub – and some cheeky advice to John Lee and family.
More on the last governor’s book-plugging event from AP.
Some worthwhile mid-week reading…
From HKFP – an op-ed on the John Lee administration members’ uniform, and how the Hong Kong authorities are extending film censorship.
A Diplomat piece says the NatSec Law has left Hong Kong ‘unrecognizable’, while HK Rule of Law Monitor offers a depressing round-up of legal developments for April-May.
Good CCP Watch interview with Timothy Cheek on ideology in China…
The amazing flip-flops in actual policy during Mao’s life and since then certainly raise your question [‘Can the Party simply appropriate any ideologies that become effective or popular over time?’]. It’s like, they just keep changing all the time, and is there a there there? One answer is, it’s all about power. And you just look at the Chinese version of the focus group and say, what will keep us in power for the next five years, and then we’ll say that.
Another ‘could China invade Taiwan’ article. One scenario – hitting US bases in the Pacific – essentially means starting World War III. Why would Beijing throw away all the progress China has made in the last three decades just for an island whose people clearly don’t want to be part of the country? It looks like a contrived ‘sacred mission’ too far.
The cum recycling bins have returned to the street corners of CWB. From this I derive that Xitler will not visit Hong Kong.
The burning bridge in Tin Shui Wai is obviously an act of sabotage, committed by “foreign forces”. Hong Kong people are not smart enough to set off fireworks like that. Personally I suspect Tin Tin to be the culprit.
Now exploding power cables. Beware the Ides of March.
Perhaps CLP is cutting back on maintenance to balance the regular losses on its Ozzie operations?
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/clp-shares-fall-after-warning-of-losses-from-australia-business-271655777972
I notice the uniform masks on the gang of “politically accountable officials” keep getting bigger and bigger. (or are their faces that small?)
I guess an iota of shameful self awareness of one’s complicity makes one especially relieved that the Zero Covid policy is maintained.
A kindergarten teacher was charged with 1 count of participating in an illegal assembly and 2 counts of assault for throwing milk tea at 2 police officers in the Langham Place shopping mall in Mong Kok.
She pleaded guilty to all charges earlier this month and was sentenced to four months’ immediate imprisonment in the West Kowloon Court today (June 22nd)
So far, a total of 27 female employees from the Children’s Residential Home (CRH) of the Hong Kong Society for the Protection of Children, have been charged with “assault on children or young people under their care”. One of them earlier pleaded guilty to pulling the hair of a two-year-old boy and then suddenly pushing the boy’s head against a wall in the toilet on 17th December 2021. She was sentenced to 4 months in prison at the Kowloon City Court today (June 22).
AM I MISSING SOMETHING??????????
“2 counts of assault for throwing milk tea at 2 police officers”
The milk tea made the offence more serious. The milk might have stained their uniforms.
Knownot, many thanks for pointing out the possible consequences of the first case.
Silly me, of course as grave, if not more so, than bashing a defenseless two year old’s head against a wall, a smelly loo wall at that, that has no doubt inflicted long lasting trauma, mental and perhaps even physical.
We can sleep soundly in Honkers knowing that our courts are impartial.