HK enters into seasonal spirit

Of the six people added to the NatSec wanted list on Christmas Eve – with HK$1 million rewards going – one is 19 years old. Chloe Cheung’s photo used in the official publicity was taken when she was 11. She describes hearing the news here.

And we interrupt this Christmas Day to announce…

In response to the slanderous remarks made by the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, officials of the European Union, politicians and anti-China organisations regarding the further actions taken by the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) Government against offenders absconded overseas who continue to engage in acts and activities endangering national security as announced yesterday (December 24), the HKSAR Government today (December 25) expressed strong dissatisfaction and opposition.

…”…Legislation that safeguards national security only targets a very small number of organisations and individuals that endanger national security.”

…”These seven abscondees are hiding in the United States and Australia and continue to blatantly engage in activities endangering national security, inciting secession and requesting foreign countries to impose ‘sanctions’ or blockade and engage in other hostile activities against the People’s Republic of China and the HKSAR. More so, they continue to collude with external forces to be covered for their evil deeds. It is therefore necessary to take such measures to make a strong blow … Foreign government officials and politicians, as well as anti-China organisations, deliberately smeared and spread irresponsible remarks on the measures and actions taken by the HKSAR Government in accordance with the law in an attempt to mislead the public…

…”Absconders should not think they can evade criminal liability by absconding from Hong Kong. Ultimately, they will be liable for their acts constituting serious offences endangering national security and be sanctioned by the law,” the spokesman stressed…

A column in Asia Times raises the possibility of the ‘offenders absconded overseas’ theatrics nudging the incoming Trump administration into dropping an H-bomb on Hong Kong…

The new arrest warrants may provide more fuel for hawkish American lawmakers to advocate for more sanctions against Hong Kong officials and companies or even more extreme measures such as the removal of some Hong Kong-based banks from the SWIFT financial transfer system, which if implemented could trigger a de-pegging of the Hong Kong dollar and to the US buck. 

John Moolenaar, chairman of the US House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), sent a letter to US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen in late November to express the committee’s “deep concern” regarding Hong Kong’s alleged “increasing role as a financial hub for money laundering, sanctions evasion and other illicit financial activities.”

“In the wake of the National Security Law of 2020, which subjected Hong Kong to the rule of the CCP, Hong Kong has shifted from a trusted global financial center to a critical player in the deepening authoritarian axis of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), Iran, Russia and North Korea,” he wrote. 

“We must now question whether longstanding US policy towards Hong Kong, particularly towards its financial and banking sector, is appropriate.”

Moolenaar said the US Treasury has taken preliminary action against entities based in Hong Kong, where the city has now become a global leader in practices such as importing and re-exporting banned Western technology to Russia, creating front companies for purchasing barred Iranian oil, facilitating the trade of Russian-sourced gold and managing “ghost ships” that engage in illegal trade with North Korea.

Just a hint of de-SWIFTing/de-pegging would create more havoc in Hong Kong than a million teenage girls inciting secession.

Still time before New Year to pull out an earlier angry government statement to response to a WaPo editorial…

A Hong Kong court last month sentenced 45 pro-democracy politicians and activists to prison terms ranging up to 10 years for the crime of conspiracy to commit subversion…

…[Hong Kong’s] judiciary, which was once widely respected as independent, has become another tool in the Chinese Communist Party’s attempt to subjugate a formerly free people.

Consider what the 45 convicted politicians and activists were accused of doing that so threatened the Hong Kong government. They hatched a widely publicized plan to hold a primary election to select the strongest candidates from the pro-democracy camp to run in legislative council elections originally scheduled for 2020. The general election was delayed when Beijing realized its unpopular pro-China candidates would lose. More than 600,000 Hong Kong citizens voted in the primary, so they must have all been part of the conspiracy, according to the Communist Party’s twisted logic.

…China’s ruling Communists, knowing they could not win a free election in Hong Kong, created a puppet version, with rules drawn to exclude opposition candidates. They then arrested most of the city’s legitimate politicians…

…The trial was a charade and the guilty verdicts a foregone conclusion; many of the 45 pleaded guilty hoping to get a slightly reduced sentence. The judiciary has long ago proved that when national security cases are concerned, it is there only to do Beijing’s bidding.

And a Japan News op-ed by Patrick Poon…

…no matter how the Hong Kong government and the judges in this case tried to justify the arrests and the heavy sentences imposed on our friends, I think many of us are still very puzzled. Can organizing and participating in a primary election be considered “conspiracy to subvert” a powerful authoritarian regime like that of China? Should organizing and participating in the primary election be an offense at all? Would those of us who cast our votes be accused of aiding and abetting an offense, too? Ask yourself if such a view could ever be acceptable in a free country like Japan.

Does this mean that the over 600,000 of us who voted in the primary election could also be considered “criminals”?