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On Sunday (8 Might), a band of hand-picked Beijing loyalists coronated Chinese language mainland marionette, John Lee, as Hong Kong’s subsequent chief government in a one-horse race for the town’s prime job.
Chosen by the Election Committee, a 1,462-strong physique of communist celebration “patriots” — who had been, by the way, vetted and accredited final yr by then-chief secretary Lee as a part of Beijing’s overhaul of Hong Kong’s electoral system — this management choice serves solely to lend a veneer of native legitimacy to Beijing’s designated lackey.
The appointment of Lee comes as no shock. A profession cop and former safety chief previous to his promotion as Hong Kong’s second-in-command final June, Lee was instrumental in spearheading Hong Kong’s nationwide safety crackdown in response to the town’s widespread pro-democracy motion in 2019.
As the town’s safety tsar, Lee oversaw an increase in police brutality, together with proof of torture and mistreatment of protesters, in addition to the arrests of greater than 100 activists, together with 47 of Hong Kong’s most distinguished politicians and pro-democracy figures.
Civil society teams, too, have suffered the wrath of the Lee-led safety crackdown.
Because the draconian nationwide safety legislation was imposed by Beijing in 2020, greater than 50 organisations, together with commerce unions and rights defenders, have been forcefully dismantled or disbanded in worry of regime reprisals.
And in one in all his lasting, most malign acts as safety secretary, Lee directed and later defended police raids on the now-defunct unbiased newspaper, Apple Each day, which led to the arrests of a number of of the outlet’s senior executives and editors.
Shuttering newspapers
The assault on Hong Kong’s largest pro-democracy paper set a harmful precedent for the shuttering of different unbiased publications, together with Stand Information and Citizen Information, and irrevocably broken Hong Kong’s press freedoms.
Lee’s ascendancy due to this fact clearly indicators the Chinese language Communist Celebration’s (CCP) uncompromising intentions for Hong Kong’s future.
As analysts have famous, although the Hong Kong regime has crushed a lot of the territory’s pro-democracy ambitions, the totalitarian securitisation of the area stays Beijing’s paramount concern.
Lee has additionally pledged to enact Hong Kong’s personal nationwide safety legislation as a precedence.
This fanatical obsession with safety — or somewhat, eradicating any remaining vestiges of dissent — comes regardless of the town nonetheless reeling from one of many world’s worst man-made Covid-19 crises.
With Lee’s appointment as Hong Kong’s subsequent chief government all however confirmed, the destiny of the town’s dwindling democratic values seems bleaker than ever. Subsequently, it’s of renewed and utmost significance that right here within the European Union, we proceed to confront the CCP’s systematic abuses and steadfastly defend Hongkongers’ elementary freedoms via concrete and concerted motion.
While the European Parliament has been a staunch supporter of Hongkongers — passing various resolutions calling for focused sanctions, lifeboat schemes, an finish to extradition preparations and a diplomatic boycott of the Beijing Winter Olympics — the EU Council and the EU Fee have continued to lag far behind.
Regardless of the council agreeing a collection of measures in response to the nationwide safety legislation way back to July 2020, together with facilitating the migration and asylum of susceptible Hongkongers and the suspension of remaining extradition treaties with China and Hong Kong inserting activists in danger, this inertia persists, because the bloc has nonetheless but to completely implement these primary measures.
In the meantime, throughout the Atlantic, the US has repeatedly sanctioned Hong Kong and Chinese language officers, together with Lee, responsible of gross human rights violations and the degradation of the town’s enshrined freedoms, while the EU has persistently hesitated to take related measures.
As a substitute, officers have opted for mere expressions of concern which have lengthy since ceased to have any moderating impact in Beijing or Hong Kong.
If the EU is severe about its dedication to democratic values and human rights in Hong Kong, then it should stand by these rules when the going will get powerful. With John Lee on the helm, the EU should leverage all diplomatic and casual channels to place stress on Hong Kong and Chinese language officers relating to their norm-breaking behaviours.
To this finish, Lee have to be added to the EU’s world human rights sanctions record, whereas the EU should additionally have in mind the deteriorating state of Hong Kong’s human rights if negotiations on the at present frozen EU-China Complete Settlement on Funding are to be resumed.
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