Hong Kong’s National Security Promises Were All Hollow
By Doug Bandow, 9/23/21, Cato dot org

When the national security law was introduced in Hong Kong
more than a year ago, pro-?Beijing politicians assured the
public it would have minimal impact.

Hong Konger Chief Executive Carrie Lam told the region’s
residents that “the law will not affect Hong Kong’s
renowned judicial independence. It will not affect
legitimate rights and freedoms of individuals that are
protected under the Basic Law and the relevant provisions
of international covenants as applied to Hong Kong.”

Moreover, she added, “it will only target an extremely
small minority of people who have breached the law while
the life and property, basic rights, and freedoms of the
overwhelming majority of Hong Kong residents will be
protected.” Similarly, Zhang Xiaoming, deputy director of
the Hong Kong and Macao affairs office, said: “The purpose
is not to take the pro-?democratic camp in Hong Kong as an
imaginary enemy. The purpose is combating a narrow category
of crimes against national security.”

That was always an unlikely prospect, given the circum-
stances of the law’s introduction, as Beijing circumvented
Hong Kong’s own well-?established legal system to stamp down
on widespread protests & pro-?democratic electoral victories.
And indeed, these claims proved false. Most of the charges
under the law target dissent, not genuine “national security”
offenses. As Georgetown University’s legal expert Thomas
Kellogg explained: “In general, the law has been used in
3 key ways: to limit certain forms of political speech; to
limit foreign contacts, & in particular to break ties between
Hong Kong activists & the international community; & to
target opposition politicians and activists, many of whom
are longtime pillars of Hong Kong’s political scene.”

Indeed, China’s allies openly lauded the law’s ambiguity
even as Lam minimized its reach. For instance, Stanley Ng,
a Hong Kong member of the National People’s Congress, argued
the legislation was ambiguous to incorporate the “real
effects of intimidation and deterrence” and “you can see the
rebels in Hong Kong are now in turmoil.” Ng’s NPC colleague,
Tam Yiu-?chung, held similar views: “Those who have stirred up
trouble and broken this type of law in the past will hopefully
watch themselves in the future. If they continue to defy the
law, they will bear the consequences.”

That’s an ambiguity that’s served Beijing well in the
mainland, where the enforcement of thinly defined charges
like “making trouble,” combined with an utterly compliant
judiciary, gives the police & officials free rein. Avoiding
the obstacles imposed by Hong Kong’s own independent legal
system, a legacy of British rule, was one of the law’s main
purposes; extradition to the mainland is now a common option
for authorities.

By the law’s first anniversary, there had been 128 arrests,
& some people were charged multiple times. Repression
accelerated last January, when the police made mass arrests
of democracy activists. Arrests under the measure continue
regularly. In early September, four members of the Hong Kong
Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of
China, which ran the June 4th Museum on the Tiananmen Square
protests, were arrested under the national security law.

In June, authorities continued to expand the law’s reach,
charging newspaper journalists & executives for the first
time. The latter’s prosecution led to the closure of Apple
Daily, the major opposition voice left in the city. As it
used national security provisions to criminalize protests &
hinder the opposition, the Lam government charged hundreds
of people under other laws for political offenses, such
as participating in illegal demonstrations, some allegedly
committed months or years before.

Older laws also are deployed to punish dissent. According
to the Guardian, in late July, “a trial began against a
radio DJ accused of sedition—under rarely used colonial era
laws—for comments made during the 2019 protests. On [Jul 30],
police revealed they had arrested an 18-?year-?old for posting
calls to boycott advertisers on a pro-?Beijing TV station, &
had launched an investigation into people who booed the
Chinese national anthem during a public Olympics broadcast.”
At that point, at least 173 democracy activists had been
arrested under the national security law and other laws.

Once known as a broadly free society despite the absence
of fully democratic elections, Hong Kong has rapidly become
a duplicate of the mainland. Even the once professional
police force, famous for its successful anti-?corruption
reforms in the 70s, was transformed. According to Human
Rights Watch, “during the 2019 mass protests, the previously

disciplined Hong Kong police transformed into a repressive
apparatus of the Chinese govt. Officers beat, pepper-?sprayed
& teargassed protesters, some already subdued on the ground.
They shot & blinded several people, including a journalist.
At press conferences, they gave patently improbable
explanations about their actions.” In January, the city
deployed some 1,000 officers to make 53 arrests of
politicians accused of engaging in peaceful political activity.

https://www.cato.org/commentary/hong-kongs-national-security-promises-were-all-hollow