Today’s supply of Mainlandizations de l’heure are mostly in the Implementation Rules for Article 43 of the NatSec ‘Enabling’ Law. Searches without a warrant, freezing/seizure of assets, intercepts/surveillance, removal of online materials and compulsory disclosure of information.
One thing it says is this:
Anyone who knows or suspects that any property is property related to an offence endangering national security is obliged to make a disclosure to the Police Force as soon as is reasonably practicable, and must not disclose to another person any information which is likely to prejudice any investigation which might be conducted following that first-mentioned disclosure.
This sounds like your roommate or landlord is liable if they do not inform the Stasi (behind your back) of the presence of (say) Joshua Wong books in your home. If ‘property’ includes money, then it applies to banks with accounts in the name of (say) Joshua’s publisher.
The parts about on-line information or messages is as creepy as it’s predictable. One potential/obvious outcome is the banning of social media sites. Which is of course why it’s called ‘Mainlandization’. Facebook is already resisting.
But wait! There’s more! Schools are now being purged of books containing dangerous ideas. And stop going on about the independent judiciary – there is no separation of powers in Hong Kong.
I’ll be working on a piece for HK Free Press over the next few days.
Some reading…
An annotated copy of the NatSec Law from Human Rights in China.
Activists ponder a Hong Kong government in exile. Sounds like a joke at first, but maybe not. Could it have less legitimacy than the current administration? (And of course it would drive all the right people totally Panda-tantrum nuts.)
Kevin Carrico sums up the new regime in Apple Daily (not sure if link will work)…
What can one write to live up to this moment? … what actually is there left to say?
How about, who cares?
After thinking it over, I have decided that the most authentic possible stance that one can take on this pseudo-law is to simply look down and laugh at it as the farce that it is.
As Kevin Carrico says, to simply laugh at the NSL is the only sensible conclusion.
Learned discussions about the NSL’s meanings and applications are ridiculous.
They presuppose that there are functioning courts of law in Hong Kong.
Not anymore.
The law no longer exists in Hong Kong.
The CCP and its local minions are going to do whatever they want, whenever they want, to whomever they want.
The colossal stupidity of the CCP in its ruination of Hong Kong beggars belief.
Germany circa 1933 has arrived in China in 2020.
What now?
For the answer, let’s go to “The Godfather”.
Peter Clemenza to Michael Corleone: “You know, you gotta stop ’em at the beginning, like they shoulda stopped Hitler at Munich. They shoulda never let him get away with that. They were just askin’ for big trouble.”
That’s where we are now.
More and more, I think that the “small group of people” targeted by the national security law are the majority of Hong Kong’s 7.5 million population (and their supporters and sympathizers abroad); which is small in comparison to China’s 1.393 billion people.
As for the speed of the Mainlandization: I guess it’s called for in their eyes since there really are so many differences (still) between Hong Kong and Mainland China.
I am already experiencing Judge Dredd style “future shock” due to “too much change in too short period of time”.
Kevin Carrico is correct. Of course that won’t stop our utterly lame media and probably moderate Legislators finessing over the finer points of the “law” and it is patently pointless.
You now live in an effective police state. Motorbike rams a few policeman and all of a sudden he’s charged under N.S legislation, not wounding with intent! Why ? Because he flying a homemade flag ? Police Motorcyclist rams protestors and we all know he’s back on duty, nothing to see here.
@Stephen, From the little we could see of the incident on TV, the cops stood in the road to stop him, putting themselves in harm’s way. But we’re probably not allowed to point that out.
Many times I stuck my head into the echo chamber telling you lot not to get carried away with your ambitions for Hong Kong. But no. You kept egging each other on until you’d lathered yourself into a meringue with the consistency of concrete. I bet now that if you could turn back the calendar, most of you would do so.
@Stephen: “Motorbike rams a few policeman and all of a sudden he’s charged under N.S legislation, not wounding with intent!”
Well it’s a good job he didn’t do this in the Land of the Free otherwise he would have been summarily dispatched by a bullet or thirty fired by half-a-dozen cops of the morbidly obese variety.
For those who read poems.
Above the line, by Thoreau. Below the line, by November31.
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2020/jul/06/poem-of-the-week-sic-vita-by-henry-david-thoreau
Reactionary #4: You’re wrong. It was always a Hobson’s choice, the only variation being whether the repression happened right away or trickled down drop by painful drop (as has been the case from 1997 until last week). Real Hongkongers would/will not accept either alternative. And you’re assuming (typically, given your cowardice and historical illiteracy) that the fight is over. You’re so very wrong.
I assume you’re polishing your resume for applications to new minor functionary positions in thumb screw maintenance. Go along, get along.
“My apologies to everyone for being such an annoying condescending insufferable twat. You were all ultimately right about me.”
Thought we’d heard the last of the troll when he posted the above last week but he can’t resist the temptation to bait, can he?
It’s a bit of a give-away when TikTok, Beijing’s own social medium, quits HK because of the new rules.
Reactor…… your time will come. You’ll be trying to weasel out of your complicity at the Truth and Reconciliation hearings circa 2035. This is the beginning of the end for the CCP.
“Reactor…… your time will come. You’ll be trying to weasel out of your complicity at the Truth and Reconciliation hearings circa 2035. This is the beginning of the end for the CCP.”
I hope you are right. I have a CCP hating mainland friend here in HK who has a fatalistic attitude about the CCP. They think that the CCP can not be stopped in our lifetime, and that the west will remain divided and will allow CCP to continue to commit atrocities just like the Nazis did.
@Where’s my jet plane: that is assuming the decision by TikTok was a business one. Perhaps there was some input from other interested parties – one social media platform down, one less channel for spreading ‘false rumours’?
@ Gromit
True but it could be an illogical decision for the interested parties to get rid of the one platform they should be able to rely on to publish “correct” material.
Anyone noticed today fortress HSBC on 1 Queen’s Road Central has opened their glass shutters which were closed during the various protesters? Following the breaking of one of the glass panels, they were (together with the side windows which are not movable but fixed glass) encased in a thick plywood covering with a friendly and colorful printed vinyl overlay (I’m sure such large glass panels are expensive and cannot be ordered off the shelf). Securing these panels was quite a bit of construction and I watched it going up over the course of a week last autumn, and I was almost certain that as of Monday it was in place. Overnight it’s gone. It implies someone is confident that there will be no more mass protests and attendant sacking of mainland-sympathetic businesses. I note the plastic water-filled barriers securing the Bank of China’s original building next door remain in place, as do those in front of the new Bank of China building down the street, and other similar banks in Central, however.
Separately a question for others who may be more astute than myself: leading Internet holders of data are suspending Hong Kong government response information about their users pending a determination of how they will manage this and future, as we have all seen. We note that this includes Zoom, a China owned company. Any view as to why this company is going along with Facebook, Twitter and Google, foreign owned businesses? Zoom is mainland owned and would want to cooperate with such requests. TicToc, another mainland owned company, has simply left the market so they don’t have to address the request or deny the requests. Again, why? It seems it would want to give this info to the police.
Interesting link about the new local enforcer: https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/5dzyw8/zheng-yanxiong-beijings-pick-tame-hong-kong.
He speaks Cantonese but only has experience in small rural areas and is most likely a front for Luo Huining. He requisitioned a whole hotel just yesterday.
@Mark Bradley
The Nazis were eventually stopped but better parallels are Soviet Union and Apartheid South Africa. Might be a while but I have a feeling it won’t survive the current leadership. And doesn’t need a massively concerted effort by the international community – just enough to tip that China economic growth below the amount they need just to stand still (which I believe is about 5.5%)
I knew it would happen one day. We all knew. But today, the day that the CCP officially opened Gestapo Plaza in Causeway Bay (at 7 AM in the morning), is also the day that Hemlock mysteriously ‘disappeared’. You connect the dots.
“The Nazis were eventually stopped but better parallels are Soviet Union and Apartheid South Africa. Might be a while but I have a feeling it won’t survive the current leadership. And doesn’t need a massively concerted effort by the international community – just enough to tip that China economic growth below the amount they need just to stand still (which I believe is about 5.5%)”
God I so want you to be correct! However my social circle is pessimistic because the CCP are experts are surviving. They survived the economic crash of the Great Leap Forward by distracting everyone with the cultural revolution. What’s preventing them from doing that again if the economy collapses in addition to tightening their grip so hard that they cling on like North Korea?
“I knew it would happen one day. We all knew. But today, the day that the CCP officially opened Gestapo Plaza in Causeway Bay (at 7 AM in the morning), is also the day that Hemlock mysteriously ‘disappeared’. You connect the dots.”
Hemmers is fine because he’s still approving comments.
“Zoom is mainland owned and would want to cooperate with such requests.”
Zoom is a US company with their HQ in San Francisco. Their founder was born in mainland China and is now an American citizen. They need to comply with US law, though it’s certainly possible for CCP to influence it by holding one of the founder’s mainland relatives hostage.
Turn Again Tong really has gone over to the dark side: https://www.scmp.com/comment/opinion/article/3092150/truth-hong-kongs-national-security-law-will-prevail-over-fog
@Joe Blow. Let’s hope the lack of entry yesterday is due to retirement-induced lethargy or a very busy post-retirement schedule. He did mention preparing a column for HKFP. Maybe Hemmers is writing a book?
@Henery & Mark Bradley – Hitler fought to the end. The Soviet Union and South Africa changed because each had a leader who recognised that their system was at a dead end. Sadly I don’t see any Gorbachev or De Klerk emerging from China yet – or being allowed to.
@Confernece I assume with TikTok they have bigger fish to fry than HK. TikTok only have 150,000 users in HK and loses money
You really sink zee “Hemmers” isss approving zee comments???
@Mark Bradley
One of the Zoom’s largest shareholders is Solina Chau, the long-time (companion? confidant? side piece? warm cockles of the heart?) of Li Ka-shing.
Here’s an article from last week detailing her investment in the company:
https://www.ft.com/content/63eb4916-7fd2-4a87-a18d-010533241a75
@Low profile
I said Hitler wasn’t a good model (in any sense…..) I also said that it would require the pendulum to swing from the jackboot tendency of the current regime to a more liberal one – something that tends to happen with a natural changing of the guard. This will definitely happen. The main man isn’t going to live forever. Maybe its wishful thinking but its the case that those in the ex-Soviet Union and South Africa also thought there was no chance of serious regime change until Gorbachov and FW emerged. And even when they did it wasn’t immediately obvious that they were going to be the catalyst for such change