The UK has reiterated its concern over China’s strategy to Hong Kong, accusing Beijing of eroding the territory’s rights and freedoms and breaching the worldwide treaty below which the one-time British colony was returned to China, prompting offended reactions from Beijing and Hong Kong.
Within the newest six-monthly evaluation of the scenario in Hong Kong [PDF], the UK authorities cited occasions together with the closely-controlled course of below which John Lee grew to become the territory’s new chief, the continued arrest and prosecution “of those that dissent” and ongoing nationwide safety trials as proof of the deterioration of Hong Kong’s political and civic life.
The report, launched on Thursday within the UK, lined the interval from January to June 2022.
“Hong Kong’s autonomy is declining, and the pervasive, chilling impact of the Nationwide Safety Regulation seeps into all features of society,” Overseas Secretary James Cleverly stated in his introduction to the report.
“Freedoms are being systematically eroded by Beijing on a number of fronts, tightening the restrictions on the lives of abnormal Hong Kongers.”
China imposed the Nationwide Safety Regulation on Hong Kong in June 2020, following mass protests the yr earlier than that generally turned violent.
The broadly-worded regulation punishes “terrorism”, collusion with international forces, subversion and secession with attainable life in jail, limiting the possibility for defendants to safe bail and eradicating jury trials. Critics say the regulation has been used to crack down on dissent with human rights group Amnesty Worldwide, which closed its workplace within the territory in 2021, arguing Hong Kong was on the highway to changing into a police state.
The most recent evaluation from the UK authorities drew offended condemnation from Hong Kong’s authorities in addition to Beijing officers.
In a press release late on Thursday, the Hong Kong authorities stated it “vehemently refutes the slandering remarks and ill-intentioned political assaults” within the UK’s report.
Hong Kong is an “inalienable a part of the Folks’s Republic of China”, it stated, accusing the UK of interfering within the territory’s affairs and urging it “to respect the essential norms governing worldwide relations”.
The Chinese language Embassy within the UK echoed these feedback, saying the UK report “distorted information, grossly interfered in Hong Kong affairs, that are China’s inside affairs, and significantly violated the essential norms governing worldwide relations”.
The UK authorities started the six-monthly replace after the territory was returned to Chinese language rule in 1997 with Beijing promising to respect Hong Kong’s excessive autonomy and distinctive lifestyle for a minimum of 50 years. Whereas the territory has by no means been a democracy, its folks lengthy loved rights and freedoms unknown on the mainland.
“There is no such thing as a doubt that China is failing to adjust to the Sino-British Joint Declaration [PDF],” Cleverly stated in his remarks. “Hong Kong’s rights and freedoms have been sacrificed to facilitate larger management by Beijing, undermining Hong Kong’s autonomy. China is diminishing the lifestyle promised to Hong Kong 25 years in the past.”
The UK stated it was intently watching the case of pro-democracy media tycoon Jimmy Lai, who additionally has UK citizenship, and whose choice to retain a British barrister was rejected by the Hong Kong authorities even after its personal courts upheld the request.
Lee referred the difficulty to Beijing’s Nationwide Folks’s Congress on the finish of November – simply earlier than Lai’s trial below the safety regulation was resulting from begin – and on the finish of December the NPC introduced its findings, saying international legal professionals weren’t fully excluded from such proceedings.
“We are going to watch intently how the Chief Government implements the choice,” Cleverly stated.
The trial of Lai, the founding father of the vastly fashionable Apple Every day, which was closed in 2021, is now resulting from begin in September.
Cleverly stated whereas the UK was ready to “work constructively” with Lee it could “choose the Hong Kong authorities primarily based on its actions”.
“We name on the Chief Government to respect rights and freedoms in Hong Kong, and to uphold the rule of regulation. It’s in China’s pursuits that Hong Kong keep its distinctiveness,” he stated.