In Hong Kong, Chinese virus rekindles old animosities towards China

Chinese coronavirus outbreak adding to tensions in a city where trust in government has evaporated and China has zero friend.
by Violet Law
The coronavirus has sparked fear in Hong Kong where memories of the 2003 SARS outbreak remain vivid, but it has also reignited long-simmering animosities

Hong Kong -- Minnie Li has thrown herself into Hong Kong's protest movement for the past few years, even joining a hunger strike last summer.
But these days the Shanghai native and university lecturer is greeted with flyers warning that mainland Chinese like her are not welcome -- all in the name of shielding residents from Chinese coronavirus carriers from the mainland.
"I don't feel hurt," said Li. 

"I see this as the 'cross-infection' of politics in the current outbreak."
The coronavirus that emerged in central China in late December 2019 has ravaged the mainland, killing more than 1,100 people and infecting 45,000 others. 

Since Hong Kong confirmed its first case on January 22, there have been 49 reported cases and one death in the semi-autonomous territory.
The outbreak in Hong Kong comes right on the heels of seven months of anti-government protests, triggered in June last year by a now-abandoned extradition bill that would have allowed suspects to be sent for trial on the mainland.
The scale of the protests revealed increasing concern that Hong Kong's freedoms -- guaranteed under the "one country, two systems" framework governing the territory's transition from British to Chinese rule in 1997 -- was being undermined; a view only reinforced by the Hong Kong government's slow response to public anger over the extradition bill and its reliance on police brutality to address the unrest.
That outrage has increased since the Chinese viral outbreak, with Hong Kong residents complaining about officials' failure to prepare for a protracted epidemic and ensure adequate medical supplies. Last week, public hospital employees went on strike to try and force the authorities to close all border crossings with the mainland.

Staff from Hong Kong's Hospital Authority went on strike this month to demand the government close all borders with the mainland to contain the Chinese coronavirus.

Observers say the Chinese coronavirus outbreak has opened a new front in the campaign against interference from the mainland in Hong Kong's internal affairs. "The outbreak comes just when protesters have increasingly turned from mass mobilisation to everyday resistance," said Edmund Cheng, a political scientist at City University of Hong Kong who specialises in social movements. 

"They condemn the government as failing to protect the public's wellbeing so they see fit to take it upon themselves to act."

Renewed anxieties
Despite the protesters clamouring to completely seal the border, two crossings remain open, although visitors from the mainland are now required to go into a 14-day quarantine.
The pressure to close the borders reflects not only fear about a new and unknown infection but is also rooted in the long-simmering tensions between the people of Hong Kong and mainland Chinese after tourism and migration from the mainland boomed in the wake of the 1997 handover.
In the summer of 2003, a few months after the SARS epidemic had battered Hong Kong's economy, Beijing relaxed visa restrictions, enabling hundreds of millions of Chinese tourists to visit.

Under the "one country, two systems" framework, Hong Kong maintains border controls, but Beijing handles visa issuance.
The visa scheme soon mushroomed to cover 49 mainland cities, bringing in 51 million tourists in 2018, accounting for four in every five visitors to Hong Kong. 

By 2018, the city, which has a population of 7.5 million, had a higher visitor-to-resident ratio than even New York City, according to the Peterson Institute in Washington, DC.
The tourism boom contributed between 2 and 4 percent of the city's GDP but sowed anger and frustration in a densely populated city proud of its Cantonese language and identity. 

Mainland visitors mostly speak Mandarin Chinese.
The visitors were attacked as "locusts" -- infamously in a 2012 newspaper advertisement -- and blamed for adding to overcrowding and other social ills.
Hong Kongers came to resent parallel traders from mainland China who took advantage of multiple-entry visas to buy products in Hong Kong to sell at a profit back home.

Over the years, scandals over food safety on the mainland, including contaminated baby formula, milk and pork, fuelled a cottage industry of parallel trading, with people just across the border in Shenzhen taking advantage of a multiple-entry visa policy to buy supplies in Hong Kong and sell them on the mainland for a profit. 

Tensions flared as residents in Hong Kong's border neighbourhoods blamed the mainland shoppers for pushing up the price of basic necessities. 
By 2015, when the Chinese government put a brake on the expanding visa scheme and limited visits by Shenzhen residents, the issue had become fodder for nativists vowing to "defend" Hong Kong.
"[For the people of Hong Kong], our government's lack of autonomy is no longer simply a political problem but now also a public health issue," said Lee Siu Yau, who studies immigration policy and identity at Education University of Hong Kong.
"You can draw a straight line from the immigration issue to the current furore over keeping open some of the border crossings."

These days, as discussions of ballooning infections and mounting casualties on the mainland dominate the online forums where protesters used to strategise, there was little mention of the mainland Chinese who have played a significant role in Hong Kong's protest movement.
Wuhan-born Edward Leung, the founder of a nativist political party currently serving six years behind bars, coined the protest slogan: "Retake Hong Kong, Revolution of Our Times," that has come to define the movement. 

Leung left his native Wuhan as a baby with his family a few years after the Tiananmen Square crackdown in 1989.

Since the handover, there has been increasing friction between Hong Kong people and mainland Chinese.

Another student leader, Nathan Law -- who was invited to represent Hong Kong's protesters at US President Donald Trump's State of the Union address in Washington, DC -- was born in Shenzhen.
By some estimates, some 1 to 1.5 million Hong Kong residents are recent migrants from the mainland. 

In all, about 40 percent of the territory's population was born elsewhere, overwhelmingly in mainland China.
With the Chinese coronavirus outbreak adding to the sense that the mainland is the source of Hong Kong's woes, some in the territory see China's Communist Party and the Chinese people as one and the same and accuse all mainland Chinese of being complicit in opposing the Hong Kong protesters.
That includes the whistle-blower doctor who died last week from the infection. 

When news of his death filtered out late on Thursday night, words of mourning were soon drowned out by cynical remarks and outright condemnation of the deceased doctor. 

To make their case, some social media users dug out the doctor's postings in support of the Hong Kong police, the brutal enemy of Hong Kong protesters.
But when Li, the lecturer, called out the discrimination and pointed out how ineffective and misguided it would be as a "protective" measure, she said she was attacked in a barrage of nasty comments on Facebook.
"It seems in order to maintain the momentum of the movement it now has to be fuelled by Sinophobia," said Li. 

"That's a real shame."

'Hong Kong is at a crossroads': inside prison with the student who took on Beijing

Joshua Wong was 20 when he was sentenced in 2017 to six months for his role in Hong Kong’s pro-democracy ‘umbrella movement’

By Joshua Wong

Joshua Wong outside the legislative council in Hong Kong, 2017. 

DAY 2 Friday, 18 August 2017
The last words I said before I was taken away from the courtroom were: “Hong Kong people, carry on!”
That sums up how I feel about our political struggle.
Since Occupy Central – and the umbrella movement that succeeded it – ended without achieving its stated goal, Hong Kong has entered one of its most challenging chapters.
Protesters coming out of a failed movement are overcome with disillusionment and powerlessness.
The appeal sentencing of myself and my fellow umbrella leaders Nathan Law and Alex Chow has dealt yet another devastating blow to the morale of pro-democracy activists.
Even though it feels as if we have hit rock bottom, we need to stay true to our cause.
We must.
To my friends who have decided to walk away from politics, I hope my being here and writing you this letter will convince you to reconsider.
If not, our sacrifices will have been for nothing.
I miss my mum’s hand-brewed milk tea terribly, and the chicken hotpot at the street-food restaurant where my friends and I always hang out.
That’s the first place I’ll visit as soon as I’m out of here.
But at the moment, my biggest worry is the state of my political party.
Ever since Nathan and I co-founded Demosisto in April 2016 we’ve suffered a series of significant setbacks.
Four weeks ago, Nathan lost his hard-won seat at the legislative council (LegCo) after he and five other members were disqualified on the grounds that they had failed to properly recite their oaths during the swearing-in ceremony.
Nearly everyone is now out of a job, while half of our executive committee is behind bars, or will be in the coming weeks.

A pro-democracy demonstrator at Causeway Bay, Hong Kong, January 2020.

My message to the pro-Beijing camp? Don’t celebrate too soon.
I began my journey in 2012 when I led the campaign against the national education curriculum.
It’s been a tumultuous five years.
I didn’t shed a single tear when the judge announced my sentence, not because I was brave but because I wanted my supporters to embrace my loss of freedom as a necessary step on our collective path to democracy.
To quote JK Rowling’s Hagrid: “What’s coming will come and we’ll meet it when it does.”
Hong Kong is at a crossroads.
The ruling regime will stop at nothing to silence dissent.
For those who dare to stand up to them, the only way forward is together.
And tonight, alone in my cell, I ask you to keep your chin up and use your tears, anger and frustration as motivation to charge ahead. Hong Kong people, carry on!

DAY 3 Saturday, 19 August 2017
I’ve been assigned a two-person cell.
My cellmate seems friendly enough, although we didn’t have a chance to say much to each other before the lights went out.
So far the biggest source of discomfort is perhaps the bed.
In fact, calling it a bed is an over-statement.
It’s nothing more than a wooden plank with no mattress.
But, then again, if I could spend 79 nights sleeping on a highway during the umbrella movement I’m sure I can get used to this too.
Twice a day, the news is broadcast on the PA system.
This morning I was woken up by a story about Chris Patten, the last governor of Hong Kong.
“Mr Patten told reporters that he was heartened by the sacrifices made by Joshua Wong, Alex Chow and Nathan Law, and that he believed these three names will be carved into history ...”
It felt surreal to hear my name mentioned.
The reality that I’m a convicted criminal has finally sunk in.

DAY 8 Thursday, 24 August 2017

Joshua Wong, the student who risked the wrath of Beijing: ‘It’s about turning the impossible into the possible’

I feel a little embarrassed about the enormous media attention that Alex, Nathan and I received last week.
Local newspapers plastered my picture on their front pages the day after I was sent to prison.
The reality is that countless others are being tried or are about to be tried in Hong Kong for their activism work.
Many face much harsher prison terms than we do.
Being phoneless is like having my limbs cut off or an itch I can’t scratch.

DAY 9 Friday, 25 August 2017
LegCo member Shiu Ka-chun, nicknamed “Bottle”, came to see me this morning.
I met him six years ago, when I was a 14-year-old secondary school student and he a social worker and radio presenter.
He later hosted some of my anti-national education rallies.
In the documentary Netflix made about me, Joshua: Teenager vs Superpower, there is a scene in which I appear on Bottle’s radio show and he asks if I have a girlfriend.
“My mum told me it’s too early for me to be dating,” I reply, and everyone in the studio bursts out laughing.
Neither of us would have guessed that five years later we would be talking to each other on different sides of a glass partition.

DAY 10 Saturday, 26 August 2017
A prison supervisor approached me this afternoon for a chat about recent news events.
He began by declaring himself to be an “independent”, and that he’s neither a “yellow ribbon” (a supporter of the umbrella movement) nor a “blue ribbon” (a supporter of the government and the police).
He asked me whether I had any regrets about entering politics and ending up behind bars, before launching into a 30-minute monologue on my conviction.
His point – if there was one: we all got what we asked for.

A protest march on 1 July 1 2017, coinciding with the 20th anniversary of the city’s handover from British to Chinese rule.

DAY 11 Sunday, 27 August 2017
Like every other day since I arrived, a handful of inmates and I spent most of today sweeping the 2,000-sq ft canteen.
We clean after every breakfast, lunch and dinner.
Most twentysomethings in Hong Kong live with their parents and many middle-class households have a live-in maid.
My family is no exception.
I’ve never cleaned this much in my life and I keep telling myself that it’s good for my character.
Twice a day, a senior correctional officer visits the facility.
All inmates have to stand in a straight line with our chests out, make a fist with both hands, and stare, not straight ahead, but 45 degrees upwards.

DAY 15 Thursday, 31 August 2017
Today I had my first dreaded morning march.
I’m scrawny and spend nearly all my spare time playing video games and watching Japanese anime.I don’t go out much and I’ve never been athletic or particularly coordinated.
I’ll be lucky to get through the march without embarrassing or hurting myself.

DAY 18 Sunday, 3 September 2017
Three years ago, I joined hundreds of thousands of brave citizens in the largest political movement in Hong Kong’s history with the simple goal to bring true democracy to our city.
We asked to exercise our constitutional right to elect our own leader through a fair and open election. Not only did the Hong Kong government – appointed by Beijing and under its direction – ignore our demands, it also arrested and charged many of us with illegal assembly.
Until recently, the charge of unlawful assembly was used only to prosecute members of local gangs. In the past, the term “political prisoner” conjured up frightening images of dissidents in mainland China being rounded up and thrown into jail.
It’s hard to imagine that the term now also applies to Hong Kong.
As Beijing’s long arm reaches into every corner and threatens our freedoms and way of life, the number of prisoners of conscience is only going to increase.
Unfortunately, few foreign governments are willing to take on the world’s second largest economy and hold its actions to account.
For instance, I was disheartened by the latest Six-Monthly Report on Hong Kong published by the British foreign secretary, Boris Johnson.
Despite the political persecution of activists like me, he concluded that the “one country, two systems” framework was “working well”. 
As a signatory to the Sino-British joint declaration on Hong Kong, Britain has both a moral and a legal obligation to defend its former subjects and speak up on their behalf.

DAY 27 Tuesday, 12 September 2017
More than one inmate has asked me: “How much do they pay you to do your political stuff?”
At first I thought they just wanted to provoke me with accusations that I take money from foreign governments.
But I’ve slowly realised the questions are genuine.
Most people don’t understand why any sane person would risk prison to do what I do if it wasn’t for money.

DAY 41 Tuesday, 26 September 2017
Today is the third anniversary of my Civic Square siege, the event that set in motion the umbrella movement and a turning point in my life.
This time three years ago, I scaled a metal fence near the government headquarters and called on other protesters to follow me.
I was tackled by a dozen police officers and taken into custody.

Wong (left), with Alex Chow (centre) and Nathan Law outside Hong Kong’s court of final appeal, February 2018. 

DAY 66 Saturday, 21 October 2017
There’s a huge variety of political views here.
The younger prisoners tend to be yellow ribbons.
Several of them have opened up to me about their involvement in the umbrella movement and subsequent protests.
But there are plenty of hardcore blue ribbons too.
Yesterday someone from the security unit pulled me aside and told me that some older guys in the workshop had heckled me and yelled “Traitor” when I walked past.
I received letters from a few university classmates today.
We started in the same year and now they’re about to graduate.
By summer next year they’ll be starting their first jobs, moving ahead in life.

DAY 68 Monday, 23 October 2017
My last day in prison came and went like any other.
By the time I’m released I’ll have spent 69 days behind bars.
They represent an important milestone in my seven-year journey in political activism.
I’ll come out of prison stronger and more committed to our cause than ever.

* * *

In June 2019, on the heels of the 30th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre, a controversial fugitive transfer arrangement with China tabled by the government set off a fresh round of protests.
It felt as if it was the umbrella movement all over again, except this time protesters were angrier and more combative.
Young people’s voices went from loud to deafening as they refused to be brushed aside as they had in 2014. Street demonstrations escalated quickly after million person marches failed to move politicians. Peaceful rallies soon gave way to full-scale urban guerrilla warfare.
A new cold war is brewing between China and the rest of the democratic world, and Hong Kong is holding the line in one of its first battles.
Nothing captures that tension more vividly than the moments on 1 October 2019 when live coverage of the 70th anniversary celebrations in Beijing were shown side by side with scenes of demonstrators braving teargas and throwing eggs at Xi Jinping’s portraits on the streets of Hong Kong.
The contrast sends a clear message to the world that China’s tightening grip on Hong Kong is part of a much broader threat to global democracy.
In May 2019, I went to prison for the second time. 
I spent seven weeks at Lai Chi Kok Correctional Institution for violating a court injunction during the umbrella movement.
I tried to comfort my parents and joked that my biggest regret was having to miss the opening night of Avengers: Endgame, the sequel to Avengers: Infinity War. 
Before I headed to prison, a foreign reporter asked me for a soundbite about my second incarceration and China’s crackdown on pro-democracy activists in general.
I thought about the discussion I had with my parents and said: “This isn’t our endgame. Our fight against the CCP is an infinity war.”
The infinity war that has ravaged Hong Kong for years, I am afraid, may be coming soon to a political theatre near you.

• Edited extract from Unfree Speech by Joshua Wong and Jason Y Ng, published by WH Allen (RRP £9.99) on 30 January. To order a copy go to guardianbookshop.com. Free UK p&p over £15.

A Defiant Stand for Freedom

Hong Kong’s struggle against tyranny, and why it matters

By Claudia Rosett

The last time a despotic power devastated Hong Kong was during World War II. 

On December 8, 1941, Imperial Japanese troops poured over the hills from China, overwhelmed the main line of British colonial defenses, and took up positions on the Kowloon peninsula, across the harbor from Hong Kong Island. 

From there, they shelled and bombed the island, then crossed the harbor and on Christmas Day completed a subjugation of the city that lasted until 1945, when Japan lost the war and Britain retook control.
Today, the tyranny ravaging Hong Kong is that of its own sovereign master, the People’s Republic of China. 

The tactics are less broadly lethal but brutal nonetheless, targeting the freedoms vital to the soul of this vibrant city. 

China is trying to grind down Hong Kong’s democracy movement, while preserving global-facing amenities like the airport and the banking system. 

It’s a campaign fought with propaganda, surveillance, arrests, and a local police force turned against Hong Kong’s own people. 

Beijing has threatened Hong Kong with “the abyss” and cautioned that “those who play with fire will perish by it.” 

Chinese dictator Xi Jinping warned in October, clearly aiming at Hong Kong’s protesters, that any attempt to divide China would end in “crushed bodies and shattered bones.”
Contrary to China’s claims, the Hong Kong crisis is not an internal matter. 

It is a violation of China’s treaty promise, after Britain’s 1997 handover of its former colony, that Hong Kong would be governed as an autonomous territory, entitled to all its accustomed rights and freedoms, for at least 50 years—a promise that China dubbed “one country, two systems.” 

It is also a warning to the world of how Beijing views frees societies and what Xi’s “China Dream” of global dominance has in store for them. 

Hong Kong is the only enclave under China’s flag with any freedom to speak out. 

At great risk, Hong Kong’s people have sounded alarms about the methods and ambitions of China’s ruling Communist Party. 

Americans needs to understand why, in this twenty-first-century contest of values, Hong Kong’s fight is our fight, too.
Hong Kong exemplifies the marvels of freedom. 

Built with free trade and minimal government, a haven in British colonial days for refugees fleeing Communist China, it is a mighty entrepôt conjured out of little more than a rocky island, a magnificent harbor, and generations of freewheeling human enterprise.
Until this year, Hong Kong figured on the world scene chiefly as a great place to do business. 

Home to 7.5 million people, with a large expatriate community, including more than 80,000 Americans, the city has long served as a crossroads of Asia and the main conduit for China’s financial dealings with world markets. 

Via Hong Kong, foreign investors in China could rely on the legacy of British law, vastly preferable to the vagaries of China’s Communist Party-driven system. 

China, in turn, could avail itself of Hong Kong’s banking system and trade, leveraging to its own benefit the privileges accorded to a territory operating as part of the free world, though under China’s flag.
At the time of the 1997 handover, many worried that China would plunder Hong Kong outright, killing the golden goose. 

But for more than two decades, no grand crisis materialized. 

Yes, Beijing was leaching away Hong Kong’s freedoms, reneging on the promise of free elections, overwhelming the city’s culture with mainland visitors— and threatening, disenfranchising, and, in some cases, jailing its most active pro-democracy figures. 

And yes, Hong Kong’s people pushed back, staging many demonstrations, some quite large—notably the 2014 Umbrella Movement’s 79-day occupation of Hong Kong’s Central business district. (Umbrellas became the symbol of the protests after they were used as protection from pepper spray.) But these protests were peaceful. 

The world yawned. 

Business carried on.
Then, in 2019, Hong Kong became a battleground. 

As it turned out, China had greatly underestimated the value Hong Kong’s people attached not solely to prosperity, but to freedom. 

In June, Hong Kong’s Beijing-installed Chief Executive Carrie Lam—a longtime Hong Kong civil servant with the political instincts of Marie Antoinette—tried to rush through Hong Kong’s rubberstamp Legislative Council (Legco) a law that would have allowed extradition to mainland China, breaching the protection afforded by Hong Kong’s separate and independent legal system. Faced with local objections that this would spell the end of whatever liberty and justice Hong Kong still enjoyed under the eroding promise of “one country, two systems,” Lam refused to reconsider.
Hong Kong erupted in the most massive protests the city had ever seen. 

It was heroic, given the risks; and heartbreaking, given the prospects. 

On June 9, a record 1 million people marched through the streets, mass protest being their only recourse in a system rigged by Beijing to deprive them of a direct say in their own government. 

Lam shrugged it off. 

Three days later, protesters physically blocked lawmakers from entering the legislature to pass the bill. 

Police responded with teargas, beatings, and arrests. 

When Lam then suspended passage of the bill but refused to withdraw it entirely, denouncing the protesters as rioters, an estimated 2 million people marched—more than one-quarter of the city’s population. 

Lam gave them nothing. 

This focused public attention on Lam herself, and the perils and injustice of a political setup that left Hong Kong’s people no way to choose or depose their own chief executive. 

In short order, Hong Kongers came up with an amplified list of demands, including universal suffrage.
A signal moment came on July 1, the anniversary of the 1997 handover, when protesters broke down doors and windows of the legislature, briefly occupied the main chamber, spray-painted black Hong Kong’s Beijing-imposed emblem of a Bauhinia flower, proclaimed a list of demands for justice and democracy, and graffitied a message in Chinese on the nearby premises: “It was you who taught me that peaceful protests are useless.”
A complex culture of protest rapidly developed, incorporating the lessons of the 2014 Umbrella Movement. 

Some brought their young children to huge, peaceful rallies and marches. 

Civil servants, bankers, teachers, and students participated in city-wide strikes and impromptu demonstrations. 

Old and young linked hands to form human chains for miles, calling for freedom and democracy and chanting the Cantonese slang phrase ga yau, meaning “add oil”—a call to keep going. 

Protesters came up with a haunting anthem, “Glory to Hong Kong,” and began singing it at sports matches, in shopping malls, and while they marched in protest through the streets.

Because leaders of the Umbrella Movement had gone to prison, the protesters of 2019 avoided anointing leaders. 

Crowdsourcing tactics online, under a slogan plucked from a Bruce Lee movie, “Be water,” they staged flash protests around the city. 

They developed a uniform of sorts and an order of battle. 

The “frontliners” wore helmets, goggles, gas masks, and black t-shirts, and wielded as weapons an ad hoc arsenal that escalated from umbrellas, laser pointers, and bricks to Molotov cocktails, slingshots, and flaming arrows. 

Support protesters, including volunteer medical teams and bucket brigades, resupplied the frontlines with everything from bottled water to first aid supplies. 

Across the city, donations rolled in to support the protests: money, food, drink, and protest gear. When police launched a dragnet in August, setting up subway and ferry checkpoints, anonymous Hong Kongers got in their cars and whisked protesters to safety in an impromptu vehicular operation they dubbed “Dunkirk.”
Instead of trying to defuse the protests with talks and compromise, Lam defaulted to the methods of a police state, dispatching Hong Kong’s cops to wield force. 

Hong Kong’s police, once regarded as among the finest in Asia, were transformed into shock troops for China, trying to beat, gas, and terrorize the democracy movement into submission. 

Police began referring to protesters as “cockroaches.” 

Stories circulated that ranks of local cops had been beefed up with members of China’s People’s Armed Police, overheard speaking mainland Mandarin rather than Hong Kong’s Cantonese dialect.

By early December, police had fired more than 15,000 rounds of tear gas, blitzing not only streets across much of the city but also subway stations, residential buildings, shopping malls, and universities. 

They pepper-sprayed pro-democracy lawmakers who were trying to reason with them, shot three protesters with live ammunition, drenched not only protesters but a Kowloon mosque with caustic blue dye from water cannons, and carried out more than 6,000 arrests. 

The protesters escalated their tactics to smashing the windows of pro-Beijing businesses and setting fire to subway entrances and street barricades. 

The police were caught on video beating and kicking trussed-up protesters and launching unprovoked attacks on bystanders and journalists. 

In November, an attempted police raid on Hong Kong’s Polytechnic University turned into a flaming battle, followed by a 12-day police siege from which some protesters escaped by abseiling from a pedestrian walkway or traversing the sewers.
Through it all, Lam remained cloistered in official surroundings, issuing periodic statements that there could be no serious dialogue until “calm and order” was restored. 

Never mind that it was precisely the lack of any genuine government dialogue or compromise that was driving the escalating havoc.
One of the most potent protests came in mid-summer, when thousands of protesters occupied the city’s airport, in a bid to force the government’s hand on a world stage, and in a venue where the police might surely hesitate to respond harshly. 

Hong Kong’s airport is one of the world’s busiest. 

Travelers transiting the outer halls of the huge building found themselves surrounded by Hong Kongers holding up signs in English and Chinese denouncing the encroaching tyranny of China. Protesters packed the arrival hall, their chant echoing through the vast atrium: “Fight for Freedom! Stand with Hong Kong!”
Near the departure desks, beneath an official sign welcoming visitors to “Asia’s World City,” protesters hung a huge banner, flanked by American flags, saying “President Trump Please Liberate Hong Kong.” 

They papered the walls, windows, and baggage carts with signs blasting police brutality and demanding justice. 

On the information desks, they replaced the brochures for shopping, dining, and Disneyland with pamphlets calling for democracy, apologizing to visitors for the inconvenience. 

One young man, wearing the protesters’ trademark black t-shirt and face mask, roamed the halls with a hand-lettered sign offering to explain the situation to baffled travelers: “Feel free to ask me, I do speak English!”
Hong Kong’s government, forced briefly to shut down the airport, finally ended the inconvenience with threats, riot police, pepper spray, arrests, and greatly constricted access. 

Large security cordons now control entry to the building, admitting only those with tickets and passports. 

Teams of security agents patrol the premises. 

Public transport to the airport is now closely monitored and sometimes greatly curtailed, to thwart any crowds heading that way.
This lockdown did nothing to address the protesters’ demands for liberty and justice, but for official purposes it fixed the problem at the airport. 

The government’s solution for the airport appears to be the template for the future. 

In Beijing’s scheme of calm and order, Hong Kong is not a polity of, by, and for the people; it is merely a large asset of China’s government. 

As such, it is the profitable utilities, not the people themselves, that the government would protect, under the cloying slogan: “Treasure Hong Kong: Our Home.”
I’ve loved Hong Kong since I first beheld it, during a family stopover decades ago. 

I lived and worked there from 1986 to 1993, as editorial-page editor of what was then the print edition of the Asian Wall Street Journal. 

With Hong Kong’s glorious sweep of hills and harbor, its kaleidoscopic street life, its savvy mix of Chinese and Western traditions, and the constant hum of commerce, it felt like the most invigorating city on the planet. 

You could fly out of Hong Kong to report on the region’s tyrannies, observing the strictures and enduring the minders of, say, China, Vietnam, or North Korea. 

Then you could return to Hong Kong, with its can-do culture and laissez-faire ways—and exhale. 

In the summer of 1989, returning to Hong Kong after reporting in Beijing on the June 4 Tiananmen massacre, I was speechless with relief. 

Hong Kong residents were staging huge protests against the repression in China. 

I was back in the free world.
That’s not how it feels today. 

In September, Lam finally announced that she would withdraw the despised extradition bill. 

But by then, her administration was importing some of the cruelties of China’s system wholesale.

During many weeks of reporting there since June, I found an atmosphere of defiance edged with fear; a city of people in face masks, keeping a wary eye out for advancing cordons of riot police. 

Under pressure from China, companies such as Hong Kong’s flagship airline, Cathay Pacific, carried out purges of personnel who had in any way shown sympathy with the protesters, an intimidation described locally as “white terror.” 

Hong Kongers, when they take their leave these days, are less likely to say “goodbye” than to warn, “take care.”
How did it come to this? 

The answer tracks back to the era of Queen Victoria, Britain’s Opium Wars, and unintended consequences, good and bad, played out over almost two centuries. 

The British did not set out to develop Hong Kong into a world-class metropolis of millions; they simply wanted a trading post, for the noxious purpose of selling opium into China. 

So they went to war to get it. 

In the 1842 Treaty of Nanjing, China ceded to Britain in perpetuity the island of Hong Kong, a name which in Cantonese means “Fragrant Harbor.” 

At the time, it was home to a fishing village, a war prize famously ridiculed by Britain’s foreign secretary, Lord Palmerston, as “a barren island with hardly a house upon it.”

The British turned it into a Crown Colony, named its harbor for their queen, and set up shop. 

They fought a second Opium War, and in 1860, China ceded the tip of the Kowloon peninsula, also in perpetuity. 

In 1898 Britain signed a 99-year lease with China for some adjacent turf, called the New Territories, stretching up to the hills that form a natural boundary with mainland China. 

That produced the full map of what we know as modern Hong Kong.
Out of this, about a half century later, came one of the great economic miracles of modern Asia. 

Hong Kong at the end of World War II was a shattered city with a population of less than 600,000. 

In 1949, Mao Zedong imposed his Communist revolution on China. 

Millions fled to Hong Kong, embracing its culture of enterprise and providing labor and talent that under British liberty and law created soaring wealth.
Not that the British permitted genuine democracy in Hong Kong; governors appointed in London ruled the colony. 

But behind that setup were the checks and balances of British democracy, to which the governors were ultimately accountable. 

Hong Kong’s people, post-World War II, had freedom of speech and assembly, and an independent judiciary based on British rule of law.
Hong Kong was a colony richly primed for democracy and independence, in an era when the British empire was breaking up and decolonization was sweeping the globe. 

The United Nations, founded at the end of World War II, compiled a list of colonies slated for eventual self-determination. 

Initially, Hong Kong was on it. 

But in the early 1970s, China swiped away that right. 

In 1971, during Richard Nixon’s rapprochement with China, Beijing’s Communist government took over the UN seat for China, held until then by the rival Nationalist government on Taiwan. 

China immediately joined the UN committee on decolonization. 

Within weeks, the committee removed Hong Kong from its list of colonies, on grounds that its fate was China’s affair. 

That was the end of any UN support for Hong Kong choosing its own future.
When China informed the British that there would be no renewal of the lease on the New Territories, due to expire in 1997, London had no appetite for a showdown over Hong Kong—considered indefensible without the New Territories, and dependent on China for its water supply. 

In 1984, Britain and China signed the Sino-British Joint Declaration, scheduling the handover for July 1, 1997. 

This treaty, deposited with the United Nations, stipulated that for 50 years following the handover, Hong Kong would be governed as a Special Administrative Region, enjoying a “high degree of autonomy,” with its people retaining their “Rights and freedoms, including those of the person, of speech, of the press, of assembly, of association, of travel”—and a host of others.
Thus did Hong Kong become the world’s only free society with a distinct shelf date. 

For Britain—handing over a substantially free population to a tyranny—the grace period allowed a face-saving retreat, bolstered by the bequest of a mini-constitution, or “Basic Law” for Hong Kong, hammered out with Beijing before the handover, in which China agreed to the “ultimate aim” of allowing Hong Kong’s people to elect their own chief executive and entire legislature via universal suffrage. 

Conveniently for Beijing, no date was spelled out for this goal.
For China, then miserably self-impoverished by decades of Communist central planning, acquiring Hong Kong was a colossal windfall. 

As a bonus, it carried the implied message that the world’s great democracies, under pressure from Beijing, would not defend their own.
If the promised half century of grace for Hong Kong sounded like a long time back in 1997, it doesn’t anymore. 

Officially, the clock has ticked down to 28 years remaining. 

In practice, if China has its way, the deadline will arrive much sooner. 

Meantime, a generation born in Hong Kong around the time of the handover has come of age. 

Many are descended from parents or grandparents who fled Communist repression in China. 

They describe themselves not as Chinese but as Hong Kongers. 

They are the vanguard of Hong Kong’s protests, and many say they are prepared to die for freedom.
This passion did not appear out of thin air. 

Nor is it a product—as China’s propaganda has charged—of foreign influence organized by sinister “black hands.” 

Hong Kong’s protesters today are heirs to a homegrown democracy movement that dates to British colonial days. 

It was fostered decades ago by leaders such as barrister and former lawmaker Martin Lee, who in 1997 greeted the handover with the defiant declaration: “The flame of democracy has been ignited and is burning in the hearts of our people. It will not be extinguished.” 

Then there’s self-made businessman Jimmy Lai, publisher since 1995 of Hong Kong’s widely circulated pro-democracy Chinese newspaper, Apple Daily, who told me in an interview this August: 

“We can’t give up. If we give up, we will have to endure the darkness of dictatorship.” 

Lee, now in his eighties, and Lai, now in his seventies, both marched at the front of some of this year’s protests.

Down the generations, this movement is packed with brave and articulate figures, including pro-democracy lawmakers whom police during the past six months of protest have tear-gassed, pepper-sprayed, and drenched with water cannon. 

Some of the youngest democracy advocates, such as Joshua Wong and Nathan Law, both in their mid-twenties, have served time in prison for their leadership of the 2014 Umbrella movement—and emerged to continue arguing the case for Hong Kong’s rights.
Hong Kong’s passion for democracy was on rich display in elections on November 24 to seats on the city’s district councils. 

These are relatively powerless positions, dealing with local matters such as bus routes and trash collection. 

But they’re the only elections in Hong Kong that entail a genuinely democratic process. 

Hong Kongers turned out in record numbers to send a message at the polls, delivering a landslide for pro-democracy candidates, who won control of 17 of the 18 district councils.
These are valiant achievements against fearful odds. 

Hong Kong’s freedom movement is up against the regime of Xi Jinping, who, since he became president in 2013, has been ratcheting up repression across China, styling himself as the modern Mao. 

Under the label of perfecting “socialism with Chinese characteristics,” the 66-year-old Xi has been establishing himself as president for life of a techno-authoritarian state. 

China’s system now includes a program of “social credit,” meant to engineer human behavior to please the party, and reeducation camps to brainwash Uyghur Muslims. 

Hong Kong’s protesters harbor well-grounded fears that Xi might have similar plans in store for them. 

“If this movement dies, we’ll be living in the Orwellian society that is coming,” says one Hong Kong academic.
Xi has thrown visible support for years behind Lam. 

In 2019, after Lam triggered the huge protests and then further enraged the public with her refusal to concede to any demands or corral the police, she was caught on a recording, leaked to Reuters, lamenting that she could no longer go to shopping malls or a hair salon for fear of “black-masked young people waiting for me.” 

A month later, she incited yet more public fury by invoking despotic emergency powers to ban face masks. 

The following month, Xi summoned her to an audience in Shanghai; Chinese state media reported that he still firmly supported her. 

By then, casualties in Hong Kong were extensive, rubble lined many of the streets, and Hong Kong’s economy had tipped into recession.
Should Americans care? 

Especially since the end of the Cold War, America has spent blood and treasure trying to foster free societies around the globe, on the reasonable theory that this tends toward a safer, more prosperous world. 

It’s a tall order. 

But in Hong Kong, with no grand programs of foreign aid and consultancies, and under the shadow these past 22 years of Chinese sovereignty, a free society has materialized, and its people are calling for us to stand with them against tyranny. 

If we do nothing but watch while China swallows Hong Kong whole, Beijing will learn the relevant lesson.
The endgame here is desperately uncertain. 

Neither America nor any other nation is likely to go to war in defense of Hong Kong. 

An armed conflict, even if meant to defend the city, would likely destroy it. 

But America can enforce its new Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act, which President Trump signed into law last month, and which requires annual reports on whether China is respecting Hong Kong’s rights under “one country two systems”—and imposes penalties if China is not. 

We can expose the lies with which China tries to discredit Hong Kong’s democracy movement. 

We can sound the alarm generally on China’s maneuvers to undermine the democratic world, and we can build up the U.S. military both to counter directly China’s military rise and to give America’s leaders a stronger hand in dealing with Beijing. 

We could offer asylum to as many of Hong Kong’s people as America can absorb. 

Not least, we can look with respect and gratitude on a people who prize freedom so highly that, while they call for us to stand with them, they themselves, outnumbered and certainly outgunned, are facing down China’s tyranny on the frontlines, in the streets of their own city.

Hong Kong's fight for freedom

China can silence me. But it can’t silence Hong Kong’s movement.

By Joshua Wong

'It is a war here now.' In Hong Kong, what began as peaceful protests has become a de facto war about the future of democracy. 

This week I was deprived of the right to participate in Hong Kong’s political system.
On Tuesday, Hong Kong authorities barred me from running in local elections for district council. 

I was the only candidate barred. 

Laura Aron, the officer who made the decision, claimed that my nomination was invalid largely because of my affiliation with Demosisto, a pro-democracy party that I helped co-found. 

She said she did not believe I would uphold Hong Kong’s Basic Law.
In reality, the decision to target me was clearly politically driven, based on my role championing democratic rights in Hong Kong and engaging with the issue at an international level. 

This is nothing short of political screening and censorship.
In mid-October, I received two letters from Dorothy Ma, an officer who was screening my candidacy, asking me to “clarify” my political views. 

Though I had no desire to play along with attempts at censorship, I responded explaining my position and noting that authorities should not screen candidates. 

I did not hear back from Ma for a week. 

Then, when I finally visited Ma’s office, I was told she was on leave due to sickness and was being replaced by Aron. 

The replacement process lacked transparency and did not follow the normal practice of appointing an officer who worked under Ma or was from a neighboring district. 

Soon after, Aron announced the decision to bar me.
When I first decided to run for the district council position, I understood that Beijing might decide to thwart my candidacy. 

The decision, and the suspicious way it was made, exposes to the world just how much Hong Kong is already under Beijing’s authoritarian grip.
This is not the first time Hong Kong authorities have infringed on my political rights and those of my fellow activists. 

I myself have been placed in jail three times for my activism. 

After spending several months in prison this year for my role in the Umbrella Movement, I was released in June, but was arrested again in August alongside my colleague Agnes Chow for participating in the protests. 

Previously, the Hong Kong government disqualified six elected, pro-democracy legislators between 2016 and 2017.
This most recent outrage shows that Chinese and Hong Kong authorities have not learned from protests. 

The protesters are calling for Beijing to respect its own promise to allow Hong Kong a democratic system until 2047, under the “one country, two systems” policy. 

This was a chance for Hong Kong’s government to show it had heard the cries of Hong Kong’s young generation and to bring a youth voice into the district council.
But Beijing is not even willing to allow Hong Kong a short window of freedom. 

Along with recent crackdowns against demonstrators on the streets, this highlights once again the importance of the protesters’ five demands for the Hong Kong government: to fully withdraw the controversial extradition bill that triggered the protests; establish a commission to look into police brutality; retract the description of protesters as “rioters;” provide amnesty to those arrested in the protests; and commit to universal suffrage for electing the chief executive and entire Legislative Council until 2047.
This is a moment when the international community must speak up. 

In the United States, the House just passed the Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act. 

After learning of the news of my barring, several senators have called for its swift passage in the Senate, too. 

This is crucial. 

Three senators have also introduced the Hong Kong Be Water Act, which would sanction government officials responsible for cracking down on freedom of expression in Hong Kong. 

These actions would signal to Beijing that it should loosen its grip or face international pressure.
My candidacy may have been barred. 

But our movement continues — and this has only catalyzed more anger and frustration among young Hong Kongers hoping for change. 

My friend and colleague Kelvin Lam has bravely decided to run in my place. 

Angus Wong and Tiffany Yuen — who were staffers under Nathan Law, a lawmaker disqualified in 2017 at Beijing’s behest — are also running for office. 

I will spend the next few weeks campaigning for them, and will continue to push for human rights in Hong Kong going forward.
And on Nov. 24, Hong Kongers must vote to have their voices heard. 

The election is a referendum on Beijing’s actions, and an opportunity to show the strength of our will and stand up for our rights. 

Beijing can bar me from running, but I refuse to be silenced. 

Democracy begins on the ground — and China cannot silence us all.

Hongkongers nominated for Nobel Peace Prize

Norwegian lawmaker Guri Melby has nominated the people of Hong Kong for a Nobel Peace Prize.
By Tom Grundy

Norwegian lawmaker Guri Melby

“I have nominated the people of Hong Kong, who risk their lives and security every day to stand up for freedom of speech and basic democracy, to the Nobel Peace Prize for 2020. I hope this will be further encouragement to the movement,” Guri Melby, a politician for Norway’s Liberal Party, said on Twitter.


Guri Melby@gurimelby
I have nominated the people of Hong Kong, who risk their lives and security every day to stand up for freedom of speech and basic democracy, to the Nobel Peace Prize for 2020 I hope this will be further encouragement to the movement: #StandWithHongKong https://www.aftenposten.no/verden/i/opPBrR/partiformannen-truer-med-aa-knuse-dem-og-male-beina-deres-til-stoev-naa-er-de-nominert-til-nobels-fredspris …

Partiformannen truer med å knuse dem og male beina deres til støv. Nå er de nominert til Nobels...
– Jeg håper at dette kan være en oppmuntring til å fortsette kampen på en ikkevoldelig måte, sier stortingspolitikeren Guri Melby (V). Hun har akkurat nominert Hongkong-befolkningen til neste års...aftenposten.no
7,447
14:58 - 15 Oct 2019

“The importance of what they are doing extends far beyond Hong Kong, both in the region and in the rest of the world,” she told newspaper Aftenposten.
City-wide protests against a soon-to-be-scrapped extradition bill have entered their 19th week, as wider anger over police misconduct and demands for democracy engulf the movement.

Melby said she wanted to encourage the movement and urge Hongkongers to continue the fight in a non-violent manner: “I specify that the nomination goes to the movement that is making these demonstrations happen. I was in Hong Kong last week, and people I spoke to there really emphasized that this is a social movement,” she told the newspaper.
Melby was barred from entering the Norwegian parliament in May after donning a t-shirt featuring the Chinese characters for “freedom” during a visit to the country by Chinese Politburo Standing Committee member Li Zhanshu.


Guri Melby@gurimelby
I forrige uke ble han arrestert av politiet da han stod fremst blant demonstrantene. I dag møtte jeg Ted Hui her i Hongkong, folkevalgt for Venstres søsterparti The Democratic Party. Vi snakket om hvorfor folket tar til gatene mot myndighetene, og desperasjonen mange føler på.

96
16:56 - 23 Sep 2019

Last year, twelve United States lawmakers nominated activists Joshua Wong, Nathan Law, Alex Chow and the Umbrella Movement for the Nobel Peace Prize.

Joshua Wong: World's pro-democracy poster child

Joshua Wong is hailed as one of the world's most influential figures by Time, Fortune and Foreign Policy magazines.
By Jerome TAYLOR

Joshua Wong is one of the most prominent faces in Hong Kong's leaderless pro-democracy movement.

Joshua Wong, the Hong Kong activist soon to visit the United States, was the unlikely hero of the Umbrella Movement that inspired hundreds of thousands to take over Hong Kong's streets for 79 days in 2014 calling for free elections.
Five years later, the 22-year-old is one of the most prominent faces in the city's leaderless pro-democracy movement, often seen on rallies, locked up by police and individually called out by the Chinese government.
Scrawny, with gaunt features and a studious frown, Wong has now taken his fight around the globe, recently meeting with politicians in Taiwan, holding talks in Berlin with the German foreign minister, and has speaking engagements scheduled in the United States.
Since Hong Kong's mass protests began earlier this year, he has been in and out of custody and was among several high-profile activists rounded up in August, a day before the fifth anniversary of Beijing's rejection of a call for universal suffrage in the city which sparked the 79-day Umbrella Movement.
The arrests were seen as a chilling warning to the current movement.

Activist at 13
Wong spearheaded the Umbrella protests alongside fellow student leaders Nathan Law and Alex Chow, and his speeches and calls for civil disobedience electrified the crowds but the movement failed to win any concessions from China or Hong Kong's pro-Beijing leaders.
He captured the attention of the world in his casting as David against the Goliath of the Chinese Communist Party, and was hailed as one of the world's most influential figures by Time, Fortune and Foreign Policy magazines.
He even became the subject of the Netflix documentary "Teenager vs Superpower", released in 2017.
Born to middle-class Christian parents Grace and Roger Wong, he began his life of activism aged just 13 with a protest against plans for a high-speed rail link between Hong Kong and the mainland.
At the age of just 15, Wong campaigned successfully for Hong Kong to drop a pro-China "National Education" programme, rallying a crowd of 120,000 to blockade the city's parliament for 10 days.
In many ways, he pioneered a method of demonstration that has since been embraced by Hong Kong's current protest movement -- seizing streets in non-violent civil disobedience -- after years of peaceful rallies failed to achieve much.
But he has paid for his activism: prosecutors came after him and many of the Umbrella Movement's leaders.

Joshua Wong and German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas.

'The city I love'
In May, he was sentenced to two months in prison on a contempt charge after pleading guilty to obstructing the clearance of a major protest camp in 2014.
He was also convicted in a second case related to the storming of a government forecourt during the 2014 protests.
He spent some time behind bars for that case, but in the end the city's top court ruled that community service was sufficient punishment.
He went on to found the political party Demosisto, which campaigns for more self-determination for Hong Kong but not independence -- a clear red line for Beijing.
Wong's demands have been both consistent and fairly simple: that Hong Kongers should get to decide their city's fate, not Communist Party officials in Beijing.
Since the end of the Umbrella Movement, he has been denied entry into Malaysia and Thailand, attacked in the street, and abused by pro-China protesters in Taiwan. 

But he has said he will fight on.
In an article written for Time from prison in June, he wrote: "My lack of freedom today is a price I knew I would have to pay for the city I love."
He stepped back into the fray shortly after when authorities released him just one month into his prison term, immediately calling for Hong Kong's pro-Beijing leader Carrie Lam to step down over her role pushing for the controversial extradition proposal that sparked the current wave of protests.
Authorities did not confirm whether the decision was procedural or a gesture to protestors.
After the bill was eventually scrapped in early September, Wong vowed to fight on, deeming its withdrawal "Too little, too late".
"Our determination and courage to fight for freedom will still continue," he said. 

"Hong Kongers deserve universal suffrage. We deserve to elect our own government."

Paranoid China does not understand Hong Kong's movement

Arrest of Joshua Wong and others will not quell protests
By Chit Wai John Mok

Without a clear marching route, protesters coordinated among themselves.

On August 30, key pro-democracy activists in Hong Kong, including Joshua Wong and three lawmakers from the opposition camp, were arrested. 

After months of protests both peaceful and violent against a proposed extradition bill and police brutality, the Hong Kong government, instead of making concrete concessions, has decided to step up repression. 

Protesters responded with more determined action.
What is unusual about this situation is that the anti-extradition bill movement is known for its leaderlessness: not a single person or organization can claim to lead or represent it. 

While it is true that the Civil Human Rights Front, the major umbrella civil society organization, has held rallies, the organization can hardly direct other local protests and militant action. 

So why would the government clamp down on these activists?
There are two major reasons, I would argue. 

First, the government and the pro-Beijing forces may still not believe that a leaderless movement is possible. 

This should not be surprising because Beijing is used to dealing only with concrete organizations. 

To China's political leaders, behind every action, there must always be a mastermind.
The current movement is facilitated by two major digital channels, LIHKG and Telegram. 

LIHKG is the Hong Kong version of Reddit, an online forum where one can debate principles and suggest courses of action for others to vote on. 

Public chat groups in the Telegram app help spread immediate information during clashes. 

Protesters on the front lines also communicate through secret Telegram groups.
Since the beginning of the movement, Beijing's mouthpieces -- such as the newspapers directed by the Communist Party -- kept on attacking long-term democratic leaders and former student leaders, such as the veteran Martin Lee, Albert Ho, Nathan Law and Joshua Wong.
In their eyes, once the ringleaders are captured, the rest of the "bandits" will disperse. 

This is a fundamental miscalculation.
Another possible reason is that the government is escalating its policy of scaring people off the streets. 

In the past months, protesters faced indiscriminate arrests, vicious police violence, thug attacks and verbal threats from Beijing.
Despite all these deterrents, they kept coming out every week. 

The government may want to send a clearer warning to protesters: there will be no mercy. 

Stay off the streets.
The plan did not work well last weekend. 

While the CHRF did call off the rally, thousands of protesters defied the ban and marched on the streets on Saturday.
Without a clear route, protesters coordinated among themselves. 

Information was dispersed through Telegram, and some people on the front lines took up the role of guiding the crowd. 

Protesters also used their own kinds of sign language or simply yelled out to raise alerts on the ground.
The situation escalated very quickly. 

The police fired the first shot in the afternoon. 

Moderates retreated, while militants responded by throwing bricks and Molotov cocktails and setting fires. 

Violent clashes extended into the evening.
At night, Hong Kongers were outraged when the riot police stormed a subway station with batons and indiscriminately beat up protesters and passengers in a train car. 

On Sunday, protesters tried to block the airport.
Hong Kongers were outraged when the riot police stormed a subway station with batons. 

 
Scholars who study protest movements have shown that movement participants and their opponents are always learning from each other. 

Like playing chess, both sides learn by trial and error to find appropriate moves.
In the early stage, when one side escalates, the other side usually follows suit. 

Since the government is far better-armed, protesters have to be more creative to keep the resistance alive.
So far academia is skeptical about leaderless movements. 

One significant example is the Occupy Wall Street movement: the occupation did help change the way people talked about inequality, but it also ended with no concrete gains. 

While leaderlessness is a form of grassroots democracy, some form of organization is always necessary for decision-making. 

The current movement may be a lesson for others.
In the authoritarian government's playbook, there are many different tactics. 

Outright violence is usually the costliest choice: it will help "restore calm," but it will not bring legitimacy. 

Instead, making concession to please moderates is usually a smarter idea.
Carrie Lam's government, however, is fast moving toward the violent and repressive end.
October 1 this year is the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China. 

Xi Jinping would not be happy if this highly significant day is marred by anti-Beijing protests, or even violence, in Hong Kong.
Lam does not have much time left, but her tactics are not working. 

Instead of calming the situation, she is sowing more seeds of anger and hatred; instead of listening to the people humbly and appeasing at least the moderates, she is turning her government into a full-fledged authoritarian police state.
Surely there will be more arrests. 

But Hong Kongers will either stay defiant, or retreat tactically and come out again when opportunities are available. 

So what can truly bring peace to the city? 

Beijing knows the answer, and Carrie Lam also knows the answer: nothing other than genuine democratization.

The Chinese Strike Back

Democracy activists Joshua Wong, Agnes Chow and Andy Chan are arrested in Hong Kong
By Shibani Mahtani and Gerry Shih

Democracy activist Joshua Wong addresses crowds outside Hong Kong’s legislature during a demonstration against the extradition bill on June 17.

HONG KONG — Authorities widened a crackdown on the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong with the arrests of prominent activists, underscoring Beijing’s growing intolerance of sustained street protests that have convulsed the Chinese territory and revived calls for universal suffrage.
Joshua Wong and Agnes Chow, who rose to eminence as the student leaders of pro-democracy demonstrations five years ago, were detained early Friday, ahead of what was expected to be another weekend of clashes in the city.
Police said the pair would face charges of participating in an unauthorized assembly and inciting others to participate in an unapproved assembly, while Wong would face an additional charge of organizing an unapproved assembly.
The charges relate to a June 21 protest where demonstrators surrounded police headquarters.
A third activist, Andy Chan, the leader of a banned pro-independence party, was arrested at the city’s airport late Thursday while trying to board a plane.
Police said he was detained on suspicion of rioting and assaulting a police officer.
The arrests come at a tense time in the semiautonomous Chinese territory, where an official proposal to allow extraditions to mainland China triggered months of protests that have descended into street battles with police.
As demonstrations have turned violent, and grown to encompass a broader push for democracy in Hong Kong, authorities have stepped up arrests and the use of force.
The dissent coincides with a politically sensitive moment for the ruling Communist Party, as the clock ticks down to the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China in October.
China’s government has issued increasingly strident threats in an effort to quell the unrest.
A day earlier, it sent a new batch of troops in to Hong Kong to reinforce the People’s Liberation Army garrison in the city.

Agnes Chow, right, and Joshua Wong outside government offices in Hong Kong in June. The pair were arrested Friday in a widening crackdown on the pro-democracy movement.

Friday’s arrests, combined with the Hong Kong garrison rotation and rumors that Hong Kong may invoke emergency laws, were “extremely alarming,” said Samantha Hoffman, a fellow at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute who studies Chinese politics.
“At the very least, it is clear that Beijing is attempting to intimidate the people of Hong Kong. The Chinese Communist Party places political protests very high on its list of threat perceptions,” she said.
“The party will protect itself before it defends the objective interests of China, the Chinese people, and Hong Kong and its people. Therefore, it is hard to imagine a solution where the party backs down in any meaningful way.”
In a report after the roundup of the Hong Kong activists, China’s official Xinhua news agency said more arrests were expected.
Hours later, Xinhua posted a picture on its social media account with a pair of handcuffs and images of the detained trio with the caption “What goes around comes around.”
A local pro-democracy councilor, Rick Hui, was also arrested Friday, his office said.
Charges against him were not immediately known.
With Hong Kong’s leader, Carrie Lam, unwilling to compromise on demonstrators’ demands, the continued unrest is taking a toll on the economy.
Police have arrested more than 800 people in connection with protests that have rocked the city since June, some of them on riot charges that can attract a prison sentence of up to 10 years.
Organizers of a planned march in Hong Kong this weekend called off the rally on Friday after police refused to authorize it.
“Our first principle is always to protect all the participants and make sure that no one could bear legal consequences for participating in the protest,” said Bonnie Leung, a convener of the Civil Human Rights Front.
Wong, 22 years old, became known as the face of the 2014 Umbrella Movement, a 79-day street occupation aimed at securing universal suffrage for Hong Kong.
He was charged and sentenced several times in connection with those protests, and served three stints in jail.
Most recently, on May 16, Wong was sentenced to two months in prison after losing an appeal against a prison term for contempt of court.
He was released in June.

Policemen pull out their guns after a confrontation with protesters in Hong Kong on Aug. 25. Police have escalated their use of force in trying to quell demonstrations. 

Along with Chow and another activist, Nathan Law, Wong went on to found political group Demosistō, which advocates self-determination for Hong Kong.
The three were arrested in 2017 ahead of Chinese dictator Xi Jinping’s visit to the city.
This time, the protest movement in Hong Kong has taken a leaderless form — in part to avoid arrests and detentions that plagued its leaders in the past, and to empower a broader base of participants. Unlike in 2014, members of Demosistō have not delivered speeches at rallies, nor have they been prominent faces on the front lines, but have used the group’s social media presence to promote their cause globally.
“We’ll use our influence and connections with the international community to tell the world about what’s happening,” Chow said in an earlier interview with The Washington Post. 
“It’s still very important.”
On Friday, Wong was seized at roughly 7:30 a.m. “when he was suddenly pushed into a private car on the street,” Demosistō, said.
Chow was arrested a short time later at her home, Demosistō added.
Both are being held in the Hong Kong police headquarters in the Wan Chai district.
The group has sought help from its lawyers.
Wong and Chow were due to travel to Washington next month, where they were to meet with lawmakers and participate in a congressional Executive Committee on China hearing on the Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act. 
The bill, which has bipartisan support, including from House speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.)and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), seeks to punish those who suppress freedoms in Hong Kong including through the use of sanctions and visa bans to the U.S.

Anti-extradition bill protesters take cover from tear gas canisters as they clash with riot police on Aug. 25. 

Chan, who founded a party that advocates for Hong Kong independence, was also arrested in August on suspicion of possessing offensive weapons and bombmaking materials.
Hong Kong operates under a “one country, two systems” arrangement within China, under which the city is supposed to enjoy a high degree of autonomy for 50 years following its return to Chinese rule in 1997.
In recent years, concerns have grown that Beijing is tightening control over the territory and working to erode the freedoms and autonomy that distinguish Hong Kong from mainland China.
In a tweet the night before his arrest, Wong wrote that “Being born in uncertain times carries certain responsibilities.” 
He linked to a website outlining protesters’ demands.

Enemy of the Chinese state: 21-year-old activist Agnes Chow

Hong Kong pro-democracy campaigner who was banned from office says an entire generation of young people is being targeted
By Benjamin Haas

Hong Kong pro-democracy activist Agnes Chow at her campaign headquarters
If China has its way, Agnes Chow’s political career will be over before it begins.
The self-described “average schoolgirl” who transformed into a thorn in the side of the Chinese leadership was last week blocked from running for political office in Hong Kong because of her party’s pro-democracy manifesto.
The unprecedented move penalises mere affiliation with a political idea and was designed to prevent Chow and her Demosisto party colleagues from entering the Legislative Council.
It was the latest blow to democracy activists in the former British colony after a year that saw popularly elected lawmakers removed and protest leaders jailed.
In the past, authorities targeted independence activists, but with Chow it was her party’s support for the vague idea of “self-determination” that doomed her candidacy.
However, the softly spoken 21-year-old is refusing to go quietly and has called on the international community to defend Hong Kong’s right to resist rule from China.
At what was once her campaign headquarters in a tiny studio in a building filled with DIY bookstores and art spaces, Chow predicts a bleak outlook for democracy in Hong Kong unless the international community speaks up.
“The ban against me isn’t personal, it’s targeting an entire generation of young people who have a different view from the government,” she says. 

“The government only wants young people who will show their affection for China and the Communist party. Any deviation of thought is now unacceptable.”
Chow renounced her British citizenship – a requirement to stand for election – and postponed her studies to run for office, but views neither as a sacrifice.
“Many people may see this as a sacrifice, but it’s not for me,” she says. 

“I’m committed to fighting for Hong Kong and it’s nothing compared to those who have gone to prison.”
As the crisis played out in Hong Kong, British prime minister Theresa May met Xi Jinping in Beijing and pledged to raise the thorny topic of human rights. 

But Chow saw the visit as a missed opportunity.
“The UK needs to show a stronger attitude, that they are really holding China to account,” Chow says. 

“I had high expectations of Theresa May’s response, compared to other countries, since the UK has an international treaty with China and an obligation to monitor the situation here.”
She describes a Foreign Office statement that said the UK was “concerned” over her electoral rejection as “weak and feeble”. 

The European Union and Canada issued more direct rebukes, saying the move “risks diminishing Hong Kong’s international reputation as a free and open society”.
And US lawmakers recently nominated Chow’s fellow activists for the 2018 Nobel peace prize, commending them for being “unflinching in their peaceful and principled commitment to a free and prosperous Hong Kong”.
Chow was not always destined to become the target of Beijing’s ire. 

She grew up in what she describes as an apolitical household where social issues were never mentioned.
But when she was 15, she came across a Facebook post showing thousands of young people agitating for change – secondary school students just like her – and never looked back.
Amid government plans to introduce “moral and national education” in 2012 – criticised by opponents as Communist brainwashing – students began staging sit-ins outside government headquarters. 

Chow joined the demonstrations and it was there she met Joshua Wong, another young activist who would go on to become the most prominent voice in a new generation of democracy advocates.
Together with Wong, Chow represented fresh ideas and a new direction for the opposition, a movement that has been dominated for nearly two decades by politicians who grew up under British colonial rule, which ended in 1997.
The pair, along with Nathan Law, founded the political party Demosisto in the wake of 11 weeks of street protests in 2014 that inspired a generation of young people but ultimately failed to secure concessions from the government over how the city’s leader is elected. 

It was their party’s support for “self-determination” which a Hong Kong official said made her ineligible to run.
“The battlefield may have changed, but our commitment to fight for democracy and human rights has not,” says Wong. 

“Maybe we can never run for office again, maybe we can never enter these institutions, but they are just a small slice of a larger cake.”
Chow and Wong both fear the government is redefining what types of political positions are unacceptable, and that it will continue its campaign against more traditional opposition politicians. Law was previously elected to the legislature on the same party platform that officials now say is a disqualifying factor.
“[Chow’s ban] shows the government will progressively target everyone in the pro-democracy camp,” Wong says.
For now, Chow has not decided if she will take her case to court. 

She has already thrown herself into working on the campaign of the pro-democracy candidate who replaced her, and has staged protests against her ban.
But the government’s decision to ban her in effect excludes anyone from her and Wong’s party from ever contesting an election, and Chow believes it is only the beginning of a wider plan to silence dissent.
“In the future I worry anyone who opposes any government policy be twisted into enemies of the state,” she says.