The Duty of Interference to Curtail Evil

US congressional committees pass Hong Kong Freedom and Democracy Act
The bill requires yearly review of US trade and business policy towards Hong Kong.
AL JAZEERA NEWSYoung Hong Kong pro-democracy activists have been lobbying in the US to exert more pressure on China, warning that an erosion of the city''s special status would embolden Beijing to crack down on dissent.

The United States Congress has moved closer to passing legislation that would require an annual review of its trade and business policy towards Hong Kong, giving a boost to the city's pro-democracy movement.
Members of the US House of Representatives' committee on foreign affairs unanimously approved the Hong Kong Human Rights Acts on Wednesday, and its Senate version cleared the committee level shortly after.
"To the Chinese Communist Party and those seeking to undermine Hong Kong's freedom and autonomy, let me be crystally clear -- the House Foreign Affairs Committee will not sit idly by," Eliot Engel, the Democratic chairman of the committee said ahead of the vote.
He said the bill demonstrates US "support for the Hong Kong people at this critical time."
At the Senate, Jim Risch, a Republican senator from Idaho and chairman of the foreign relations committee, also welcomed the bipartisan vote.
"After more than two decades of broken promises, it is time that we hold the Chinese Communist Party accountable for its erosion of Hong Kong's autonomy," he said.
With the committee approvals done, the bill heads for a vote in both chambers of the US Congress.

The House and Senate versions of the legislation need to be identical before a final vote can commence. 

Senator Marco Rubio, the author of the Senate version, urged the quick passage of the bill and approval by US President Donald Trump.
He said China should be held "fully accountable for its ongoing efforts to undermine Hong Kong's freedoms and autonomy."
A separate bill, known as PROTECT Hong Kong Act, which seeks to ban sales of riot-control equipment to Hong Kong law enforcers, is also pending in the US Congress.

I am proud @SenateForeign today passed the #HongKongHumanRightsandDemocracyAct. After more than 2 decades of broken promises it's time we hold the CCP accountable for erosion of Hong Kong autonomy. We are all proud to stand with Hong Kongers in pursuit of fundamental freedoms.— Jim Risch (@SenatorRisch) September 26, 2019

On Tuesday, President Trump told the UN General Assembly in New York that Beijing must protect the former British territory's democratic way of life.

A separate bill, known as PROTECT Hong Kong Act, which seeks to ban sales of riot control equipment to Hong Kong law enforcers, is also pending in the US Congress.

Hong Kong activists, including Joshua Wong, have been lobbying for the passage of the legislation, appearing before committee hearings in Washington, DC.
Last week, Wong told American legislators that Beijing "should not have it both ways, reaping all the economic benefits of Hong Kong's standing in the world, while eradicating our sociopolitical identity."
Hong Kong, an autonomous Chinese city and former British colony, has been rocked by protests for months, following the city's decision to introduce an extradition bill, which would have allowed its citizens to be prosecuted in mainland China.
Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam was eventually forced to withdraw the bill, but protests continued with demonstrators denouncing what they said was Beijing's interference of Hong Kong affairs.
On Thursday, Lam will hold her first talks with members of the public in a bid to resolve a political crisis that has fuelled nearly four months of protests and plunged the city into chaos.

Free Tibet

Tibet Reciprocity Act Passes in the US Congress
By Richard Finney

The Potala Palace, former residence of Tibet's spiritual leader the Dalai Lama, is shown in a file photo.

In a strong show of bipartisan support, the U.S. Congress on Dec. 11 passed legislation demanding access to Tibet for American journalists and diplomats now routinely denied entry by Chinese authorities to the Beijing-ruled Himalayan region.
The Reciprocal Access to Tibet Act of 2018 will require the U.S. Secretary of State, within 90 days of the bill being signed into law, to identify Chinese officials responsible for excluding U.S. citizens from China’s Tibet Autonomous Region, and then ban them from entering the United States.
The bill had earlier passed in September in the U.S. House of Representatives, and then went to the Senate for approval.
The legislation is based on the diplomatic principle of reciprocity, in which “countries should provide equal rights to one another’s citizens,” the Washington D.C.-based International Campaign for Tibet (ICT) said in a Dec. 11 statement welcoming passage of the bill.
Travel by Americans in Tibet is now highly restricted, though “Chinese citizens, journalists from state-sponsored propaganda outlets and bureaucrats of the Chinese Communist Party travel freely throughout the US and lobby the American government on Tibetan issues,” ICT said.
A formerly independent nation, Tibet was taken over by and incorporated into China by force nearly 70 years ago, following which Tibet's spiritual leader the Dalai Lama and thousands of his followers fled into exile in India.
Chinese authorities now maintain a tight grip on the region, restricting Tibetans’ political activities and peaceful expression of ethnic and religious identities, and subjecting Tibetans to persecution, torture, imprisonment, and extrajudicial killings.
“China’s repression in Tibet includes keeping out those who can shine a light on its human rights abuses against the Tibetan people,” Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL), one of the bill’s sponsors in the Senate, said in a statement.
“We should not accept a double standard where Chinese officials can freely visit the United States while at the same blocking our diplomats, journalists and Tibetan-Americans from visiting Tibet.”
“I look forward to President Trump signing this bill into law that will help restore some measure of reciprocity to America’s relationship with China,” Rubio said.

China's war on law: victims' wives tell US Congress of torture and trauma

Women whose husbands were targets of Communist party crackdown on human rights lawyers call for US sanctions
By Tom Phillips in Beijing

Chen Guiqiu (3rd L), the wife of detained human rights lawyer Xie Yang, with other wives of detained human rights lawyers wearing the names of their husbands on their dresses in 2016. 

The wives of some of the most prominent victims of Xi Jinping’s crackdown on civil society have stepped up their campaign for justice, backing calls for US sanctions against Chinese officials involved in barbaric cases of torture and abuse.
Addressing a congressional hearing in Washington on Thursday, the women, whose husbands were among the key targets of a Communist party offensive against human rights lawyers, detailed the physical and psychological trauma inflicted by China’s war on law.

Chen Guiqiu, who fled to the United States in March, told of how her husband, the attorney Xie Yang, had been imprisoned and brutally tortured because of his work defending victims of land grabs, religious persecution and dissidents.

She described her husband’s ordeal as an example of China’s lawlessness and claimed that at his recent trial Xie had been forced to refute detailed claims that he had been the victim of sustained and brutal campaign of torture.
Wang Yanfeng, the wife of Tang Jingling, a lawyer and democracy activist who was jailed in 2016 in what campaigners described as “a gross injustice”, said her husband had suffered repeated spells of abuse, threats and torture. 

“Today other [lawyers and political prisoners] are still suffering from such torture,” Wang said, calling on Donald Trump to challenge China over such abuses.
In a video message, Li Wenzu, the wife of lawyer Wang Quanzhang, said she had heard nothing from him since he was seized by police at the start of the campaign against lawyers in July 2015. 

“I am deeply concerned about my husband’s safety. I don’t know how his health is. I don’t know whether he has been left disabled by the torture. I don’t even know whether he is alive.”
Wang Qiaoling, whose husband, Li Heping, recently emerged from a 22-month stint in custody, said he returned home looking “20 years older” and had told of being forced to sit for hours in stress positions and being shackled with chains. 

“He suffered from very cruel and sick torture,” Wang added.
Also giving testimony was Lee Chin-yu, whose husband, the Taiwanese human rights activist Lee Ming-che, vanished into Chinese custody in March after travelling to the mainland. 

“I stand alone before you today to plead for your help for my husband,” Lee said, calling on Washington to pressure China to end her husband’s “illegitimate detention”.
Since China’s crackdown on lawyers began almost two years ago, its victims’ wives have emerged as a relentless and forceful voice of opposition, often using humorous online videos and public performances to champion their cause. 

They say they have done so in defiance of a campaign of state-sponsored intimidation that has seen them trailed by undercover agents, struggle to enrol their children into schools or be evicted from their homes.
Terry Halliday, the author of a book about China’s human rights lawyers, said the lawyers’ wives had opened up “a new line of struggle that we have not seen before in China”.
“These women have become a very powerful and visible public presence both of criticism of the government, of appeals for the release of their loved-ones but also impugning China in the eyes of the world. It is remarkable.”
“It’s a whole new front,” Halliday added. 

“It is not so easy for the government to silence wives and daughters.”
Thursday’s hearing was part of a push by human rights groups to convince the Trump administration to use a law called the Magnitsky Act to bring sanctions such as travel bans or property seizures against Chinese officials involved in human rights abuses.
“We should be seeking to hold accountable any Chinese officials complicit in torture, human rights abuses and illegal detentions,” said Chris Smith, the Republican congressman who chaired the session and said he was compiling a list of potential targets.
Smith said he hoped such action could help end the “shocking, offensive, immoral, barbaric and inhumane” treatment of Chinese activists that has accelerated since Xi Jinping took power in 2012.
“While Xi Jinping feels feted at Davos and lauded in national capitals for his public commitments to openness, his government is torturing and abusing those seeking rights guaranteed by China’s own constitution,” Smith said.