Chinese state media warn Hong Kong against abandoning ‘zero-Covid’ and living with the disease…
[Xinhua] said achieving “dynamic zero” remains the most useful strategy for the city as its vaccination coverage of just 80 percent receiving at least one shot is insufficient and giving up measures to achieve zero infections will lead to “unbearable consequences” for the economy and public health.
“It is too early to adopt the ‘live with the virus’ approach, which is not supported by science and will only heavily shock Hong Kong’s medical system, not to mention [delay] quarantine-free cross-border travel with the mainland,”
Just when it seemed Chief Executive Carrie Lam and her administration might start to ease off, Beijing expects her to go full King Cnut on the virus.
What’s the purpose? Presumably, Hong Kong cannot be allowed to prove Beijing wrong. The CCP must save face and maintain the line that it is saving China from the calamitous barbarism of other countries that are opening up and adjusting to Omicron as endemic. (And from evil foreign vaccines. Or – if paranoid conspiracy theories seem more rational in these times – because the NatSec-Covid regimes are killing Hong Kong nicely in preparation for the city’s absorption into the Greater Bay Area hub-zone.)
As the virus spreads regardless, some cross-border truck drivers are inevitably going to test positive. Panic-buying of fresh vegetables means there are virtually no greens in the supermarkets. People must now resort to eating hamsters. Oh no wait, they can’t because the government has shot them all. But hey – at least we have patriots-only running Hong Kong.
Which brings us to this… Not sure why the Foreign Correspondents Club saw fit to host supposed CE ‘election candidate’ Checkley Sin, but the Q&As proved to be quite entertaining and indeed illuminating about how loyalists think. OK, ‘think’. Watch here to see him refuse with a disturbing, almost petrified, grin to answer any questions about his platform or government policy on the grounds that it’s ‘quite dangerous’. More here.
Nice one — bonne continuation!
The guileless Mr. Sin would be a more amusing CE than Mrs. Lam.
1. Checkley Sin reminds me of any local crazy Chinese uncle who has nothing behind his toothy grin but non sequiturs and conspiracies, whom you will find at the local park playing a game of Chinese poker or mah jong. He’s the type who will walk up to the gweilo on the street and just yell out “Hello English!”
2. “It is too early to adopt the ‘live with the virus’ approach, which is not supported by science…” — Excuse me what?
3. Whatever became of the two cats who had caught Covid19? I fully expected a cull of all felines within days, but nothing ever materialised. So did the local rags, as they ran this headline for three days.
4. Hong Kong… what a clown show.
Checkley is the perfect, living example of how to do a stereotyped parody of a Hong Kong person.
Article from The Times of London this morning: We should pull our judges out of Hong Kong
Available here: https://archive.ph/xsJXl
D3SH: I’m sure the argument for keeping UK judges in HK is similar to the whole charade of allowing the CCP to join such international bodies as the WTO, Interpol, the UN, etc: “If we engage them and allow them to work within the international rules based system, it will surely liberalize them and make them see the light.” That’s been working *so* well, no?
Fuck the CCP and let Shit Jumping develop his bromance with Vlad in their little entente of douchebags. Two thugs in the same room trusting each other’s every move and backing each other up if necessary? Yeah, that’ll work out well, too.
@D3SH – Another view on the matter:
https://www.ejinsight.com/eji/article/id/3031918/20220131-Tinkering-with-justice
“Rule by People’s Daily”. Very efficient. All the CENO has to do now is read the paper in the morning and she knows what to do. Easy. I guess I put my name down for next ‘elections’! But ohh, there is real competition now. Can the FCC please invite me too?
Checkley is not so much a leadership hopeful as a leadership hopeless.
Although he is to be applauded in the amazing feat of being even more unprepared, feeble-minded, out-of-touch, and unhinged than the current CE.
As to foreign journalists working in Hong Kong illegally, he should almost certainly keep quiet about that. The only example that has solid evidence was the Global Times “journalist” Fu Guohao who got tied up and beaten in the airport as a spy. His entire journalistic career consisted of 3 articles on Hong Kong all done illegally on a tourist visa (which we have photos of, because they nabbed his passport and showed it to the other journalists there). Ahem. Checkley may have to see someone in their office about this later…
@Penny
For some strange reason, I suspect that Neville Sarony *QC* *SC*, the *Hong Kong-based barrister* may have a teeny bit of a vested career interest in keeping the veneer of normality that the UK judges provide and arguing, against all the actual evidence of the past two years, that the HK justice system has not been completely derailed by the NSL and the HKSARG, but has merely suffered “a dent” that will (one presumes) ‘buff out nicely’.
I think Samuel Bickett would disagree with Neville Sarony. Unfortunately it seems that he will have to go back to prison to serve out his original sentence.
Checkley Sin’s policy platform seems to focus mainly on destroying the peaceful beauty of Lamma Island, ruining the harbour so many people fought hard for years to save, and “moving most of the cemeteries and columbaria to remote islands” to inconvenience the old folks going to pay their respects to their departed relatives. Plus of course doing whatever Beijing wants. So, a winning combination for sure.
Neville Sarony is wrong.
NSL Article 60 says:
“The acts performed in the course of duty by the Office for Safeguarding National Security of the Central People’s Government in the HKSAR and its staff shall not be subject to the jurisdiction of the HKSAR.”
According to the NSL, these mainland fellows can lift any person in Hong Kong at any time for any reason, or for no reason at all, and there isn’t a thing any Hong Kong official or judge, permanent or otherwise, can do about it.
That’s why judges with a conscience should not rent out their reputation and credibility to this ugly simulacrum of a justice system.
MR. Samuel Clemens;
I don’t think you have to worry about so-called British judges being singled out to perform these duties. I believe these judges are hand picked precisely for the reason that if they were not, the trial might be judged by someone who believes in human rights.
If you will permit me, l’ll share this. It comes from:
voices-of-variety.com/leslie-sarony/
“Sarony, undisputed king of the nonsense song, composed, performed and recorded even sillier numbers – hundreds of them between 1926 and 1939 – Don’t Do That to the Poor Puss Cat, I Caught Two Cods Cuddling, The Sizzle of the Sausage, Icicle Joe the Eskimo, Fat Flat Fish, Ain’t It Grand to be Blooming Well Dead, Wheezy Anna, The Wedding of the Garden Insects, I Found a Hard-Boiled Egg in my Love-nest, Umpa Umpa Stick it up Your Jumper, The Dicky Bird Hop and There’s a Song They Sing at a Sing-Song in Sing-Sing, to name just a few, the majority under his own name and others under whimsical noms de plume such as Q. Cumber.”
Clearly, Leslie must have had a profound influence on his son, not least in terms of his “whimsical nom de plume…Q. Cumber” which must surely have inspired young Neville to become a QC.
Incidentally, Sarony père’s ditties, many of which are available on the You Tube, are well worth a listen in that they provide a welcome tonic in these bleak times.
‘Dynamic Zero’ – decent indie band name but poor maths
Checkley Sin’s policy platform seems to focus mainly on destroying the peaceful beauty of Lamma Island
Thank heavens he doesn’t know about the western side of Lamma.
On other matters, Mr Hemlock, your header reads “Watching the sun set, little by little…” Maybe it is time to change “little by little” to “warp speed”
I know that I have, in the past, implored you fine people to BOYCOTT LAN KWAI FONG. The reason being that the King of Usury, by the name of Dr. Allan Zeman, who incidentally is now begging the Government for hand-outs, had been squeezing his tenants for every last dollar, when the going went good. Also, because Dr. Zeman, who is devoid of scruples or principles of any kind, opposed the Umbrella Revolution in 2014 (“bad for business”) and who recently has emerged as a “Super Patriot” who loves the Glorious Motherland more than his own mother. (ditto: Mike Rowse).
Not so long ago, Dr Zeman terminated the resto lease of the renowned celebrity chef Joël Robuchon in his failing California Tower. He tried to squeeze the very last dollar but it backfired. Now he is asking the HK tax payers for generous handouts again. I hope the Government won’t fall for that ruse.
Isn’t Lamma Island the place you go to get run-over by souped up golf carts speeding down narrow pedestrian walkways?
/Or am I thinking of Cheung Chau?
After my comment yesterday, it occurred to me that Checkley’s development plan for Lamma Island would wipe out Hong Kong’s only known nesting place for green sea turtles, an endangered species. That would make him an unforgivable Sin indeed.
I’ve been boycotting LKF for years. Wanchai is closer to home.
@Hamantha
Or am I thinking of Cheung Chau?
Yes. Lamma has VVs that are faster and usually heavily overloaded.