Big Lychee, Various Sectors

The Sunbeam Theatre in North Point is famed for a gloriously garish foyer that delights passers-by and Cantonese opera performances that few under-70s find appealing. The site was on offer a few years back for HK$1.2 billion. Now prices have fallen to something more like just one ‘bil’ (been watching Succession), the Island Evangelical Community Church is buying it. Pastor Brett says the property…

will … provide fantastic opportunities to bless the community with meaningful retail space, some limited housing, and great space for ongoing ministry 24/7.

(I know a few members of this congregation. It is evangelical in the religious rather than political sense, but obviously well-heeled.)

‘How can we ask tourists to believe us when Hong Kong holds another major event?’ asks lawmaker Doreen Kwong after the government spends HK$16 million to attract the Inter Milan soccer team to play here, and mega-star Messi sits on the bench the whole game.

[Correction: Inter Miami. Never heard of them.]

Officials seek to reassure that the Article 23 NatSec Law will not infringe people’s rights…

The government is also looking into ways to delay or stop suspects from meeting their lawyers, as [Justice Secretary Paul] Lam said this is to prevent lawyers from being a channel of communication for suspects to continue their behavior to endanger national security.

“The principle of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights is that we cannot unreasonably delay,” Lam said.

“We will balance defendants’ rights to consult a lawyer, but also prevent defendants from abusing this right.

…Secretary for Security Chris Tang Ping-keung said exaggerating legislative or district councillors’ performance to incite hatred might also breach the future Article 23 legislation.

“Whether or not a behavior breaches the law will depend on their intention and consequences,” Tang said.

“It is very reasonable to provide an opinion on people taking public office, but if they exaggerate things, only illustrate one side of the truth or even make up information and are intended to incite hatred, then he or she will breach the law.”

…Financial Secretary Paul Chan Mo-po said the enactment will be beneficial to “maintain a good business environment” in Hong Kong.

(So you can be arrested for ‘only illustrating one side of the truth’?)

Standard editorial notes…

In the blink of an eye, roughly a quarter of the public consultation period promised for the Article 23 legislation is gone.

From David Webb…

Thought on Sunday from an atheist: if Christians in HK pray to their God that NSL defendants are acquitted & freed, does that constitute requesting a foreign individual to interfere & endanger NatSec, thus a breach of NSL? Will God be at risk of conviction and punishment? 

What if the prayer is spoken in a church?  Does that constitute an NSL offence? Or will there be no case to answer because the Govt cannot prove that God exists, therefor no foreign force is involved?

Some links from the weekend, starting with two from the (paywalled) Economist…

On the Article 23 NatSec Law…

After a four-week public consultation, the new measure is expected to be swiftly passed by the city’s legislature, which is packed with Communist Party supporters. The statute will cover acts such as treason, insurrection and sabotage. The government says it will complement the one imposed by the central government. Some of the acts the new law will proscribe are distinct, such as espionage. Nevertheless, given that the existing law is so broad and ill-defined, it is difficult to conceive of an activity that would fall foul of the new law and not already be covered by the old one, says a barrister in the city.

And on the government’s plans to close the HK Heritage Museum…

[Aruist Kacey Wong] organised a petition calling on the government to keep the Heritage Museum as is and expected around 60 signatures. Some 700 Hong Kongers signed it; many are associated with the pro-democracy movement and so have left the city. He does not expect the government to take any notice of their anger. Hong Kongers living abroad will preserve the city’s culture, he says. But “if you’re staying in Hong Kong then you have to endure.”

The Spectator reviews The Political Thought of Xi Jinping by Steve Tsang and Olivia Cheung…

Xi and the CCP are solipsistic in the vulgar rather than true philosophical sense. They are supremely self-centred in their belief that the external world should exist or conduct itself only in so far as it reflects the CCP’s reality.

…Tsang and Cheung have done the hard work for us by ‘munching rhinoceros sausage’, as the sinologist Simon Leys described reading CCP documents. They have read the corpus of Xi’s books and speeches and ‘swallowed bucketfuls of sawdust’ (Leys again). 

From China File, an interview with journalist Chun Hang Wong on why Xi Jinping is not a ‘second Mao’…

[Mao’s rival Party leader] Liu Shaoqi, who was the arch Party-builder. Liu really believed in internal discipline, internal propaganda, internal political education. Liu wanted to ensure the Leninist hierarchy of the Party remained strong. Mao, by contrast, mobilized normal people to destroy the Party from the outside. This is something Xi Jinping would never do. The Party is his one true vehicle of power, the one instrument he has for implementing his vision. Xi is only powerful if the Communist Party is powerful. Xi’s internal purges, the internal Party inquisitions, emphasis on discipline, that’s from Liu Shaoqi. Xi Jinping doesn’t proclaim that theme loudly in public, but you can tell from the way he does things. Mao wouldn’t have done it that way.

And from a week ago – Gavekal Dragonomics’ Dan Wang’s annual letter. Parts II and III are about young Chinese ‘running’ overseas and related matters. Long, but worth it…

2023 was a year of disappearing ministers, disappearing generals, disappearing entrepreneurs, disappearing economic data, and disappearing business for the firms that have counted on blistering economic growth.

No wonder that so many Chinese are now talking about rùn. Chinese youths have in recent years appropriated this word in its English meaning to express a desire to flee. For a while, rùn was a way to avoid the work culture of the big cities or the family expectations that are especially hard for Chinese women. Over the three years of zero-Covid, after the state enforced protracted lockdowns, rùn evolved to mean emigrating from China altogether.

…The Chinese who rùn to the American border are still a tiny set of the people who leave. Most emigrés are departing through legal means. People who can find a way to go to Europe or an Anglophone country would do so, but most are going, as best as I can tell, to three Asian countries. Those who have ambition and entrepreneurial energy are going to Singapore. Those who have money and means are going to Japan. And those who have none of these things — the slackers, the free spirits, kids who want to chill — are hanging out in Thailand.

NatSec panic as ‘Liberate Hong Kong’ slogans are found on the sidewalk in Wong Tai Sin. Police conclude they were left over from 2019, and the paint covering them had worn off. Phew!

A theatrical group is barred from holding performances at the Hong Kong Institute of Contemporary Culture Lee Shau Kee School of Creativity after the Education Bureau accuses its founder of ‘inappropriate remarks linked to controversial and sensitive issues’. 

Poor octogenarian property tycoon SK ‘Henderson’ Lee. After over half a century of minting money playing the utterly non-innovative Hong Kong property scam, his attempt at encouraging imagination and originality comes to this. (There was a time when encouraging ‘creative’ arts and culture – like ‘critical thinking’ – was official policy. Lee’s donation was probably in line with this. Nowadays it would be a Xi Jinping Thought institute.)

The government did not include the HK Journalists Association in preliminary consultations on the Article 23 NatSec Law…

“[HKJA] believes anyone can be a reporter. It has counted 13-year-old children, or even those foul-mouthed individuals who made derogatory comments while filming our female officers, as professional reporters. We found it to be unrepresentative, therefore we didn’t reach out to it,” [Security Secretary Chris] Tang said in Cantonese after meeting with representatives from the media industry.

Bloomberg op-ed on Hong Kong’s forthcoming NatSec Law-Plus…

Watching Chief Executive John Lee deliver his press briefing on the public consultation of Article 23 was an exercise in surrealism. He consistently put forward the idea that the city needs this on top of the National Security Law, which was passed in 2020… At the time, Beijing said the measures were intended to bring calm back to Hong Kong’s streets, which had been rocked by pro-democracy protests. In reality, it was about control. The Hong Kong government is making similar arguments for its new law, saying it is intended to keep the financial hub safe and attract investors. It is yet another poor attempt at justifying even further restraints.

By any measure, Hong Kong is a shadow of its former self, both in terms of economic vibrancy and political activity. With this new plan, the Chinese transformation of the city is now almost complete, and Article 23 is just the latest piece of the jigsaw. The government says this will attract foreign interest and funds, but the strategy is at best disingenuous, and at worst, a charade that officials are hoping the international business community will buy.

The Young Post – which seems to employ the SCMP‘’s only investigative journalists – has a good piece on those ugly new street signs…

“The font aims to infuse a rich cultural ambience into the landscape and atmosphere of the community. It is well-proportioned, and its overall design is consistent with existing nameplates, effectively providing street information to the public,” said the Highways Department in an email response to Young Post last Thursday.

…According to the official website of Wen Yue Type – the mainland Chinese company that introduced the font – the typeface showcases rich calligraphic features, conveys a sense of rhythm, and creates a strong, humanistic atmosphere. Alibaba, which is the owner of the South China Morning Post, is an investor in this company.

…Another concern regarding the new font is its lack of adequate traditional Chinese characters for the city’s intricate street names.

Some weekend reading…

ArtNet looks at Hong Kong artists in exile in the UK…

[Artist Justin Wong] … spoke of feeling “liberated” in his art practice. Rather than focusing on the day-to-day socio-political issues of his hometown, life as a member of the Hong Kong diaspora has become the inspiration for his new projects. He has returned to woodblock printing, his main practice during his art school days. While experimenting with his newfound freedom, he has created the “Little Pink Man” series, which taps into the emotional struggle experienced by many Hong Kong migrants. “Indeed, we need time to reflect on this,” he noted. “This is an era of diaspora, so there should be art of the diaspora.”

The Journal of Democracy does a comparison of pro-dem movements in Thailand and Hong Kong…

Bangkok progressives have more reason for hope than their Hong Kong counterparts. This is a dramatic reversal from the mid-2010s, when Bangkok’s young progressives could only dream of being able to stand up and fight the way the Umbrella Movement had. In May 2023, Rangsiman, along with many other candidates from his Move Forward party, was elected to the Thai parliament in the second national election since the 2014 coup. Hong Kong activists, in contrast, have little obvious cause for optimism today, and must now find subtle ways to keep a spirit of resistance alive. Those who remain in the city are either fearfully awaiting the dreaded knock at the door or already languishing in prison. The remainder, like Nathan Law, live in exile. All are lamenting the loss of the freedoms they once had.

From Bloomberg – Greater Bay Area in action: Mainland-born professional Emma Leng moves from Hong Kong to Shenzhen – commuting in the opposite direction…

The 29-year-old is among a growing number of young white-collar professionals trading expensive, cramped quarters in Hong Kong for less pricey and roomier digs in Shenzhen … Additional perks include cheaper, round-the-clock food delivery options and cleaner air.

…driving the trend is the sharp increase in Hong Kong rents. That’s caused, in part, by an influx of mainland nationals, a result of new visa policies aimed at attracting talent. The government last year issued some 44,000 visas to mainland nationals under its Top Talent Pass scheme, which grants entry visas to graduates of the world’s top 100 universities.

Leng pays about 6,000 yuan ($836) a month for her 65-square-meter (700-square-foot) two-bedroom apartment in Shenzhen, $700 less than what she paid for the one-bedroom, 29-square-meter place she had in Hong Kong. Rents in Shenzhen run at about 108 yuan a square meter per month, less than a third of Hong Kong’s prices.

In the Diplomat – China’s inability to do ‘soft power’ 

[The old ‘friendly’ image] has fractured amid China’s increasing willingness to use its material power to pursue its own interests – to the detriment of both individual states and the international order.

…a more assertive “wolf warrior” foreign policy and diplomatic language, which has been materially and rhetorically committed to opposing liberal values and democratic institutions in favor of a more robust defense of Chinese values, China’s territorial claims, and the extension of Chinese material power. Concens deepened with the use of China’s trade and investment prominence to “punish” states, such as Australia and Lithuania, that pursue policies or hold viewpoints that China considers unacceptable. 

In some instances, this has generated a dangerous cycle of mutual recriminations as politicians in other states have focused on Beijing’s actions and rhetoric to sustain their own power based on insular nationalist tropes and appeals. As such, China has been more and more confronted by the United States, the European Union, United Kingdom, and other states across a range of areas. China has had border clashes with India and is the target of re-calibrations in the defense policies of Australia, Japan, and the Philippines. Still other states are openly attempting to lessen their dependence on Chinese trade and investment. 

…The Taiwanese election is an example of such a problem. Since the changes in Hong Kong, Taiwanese people have felt less and less attraction to China. This is hardly surprising, as Beijing insists on the same “One Country, Two Systems” formula used in Hong Kong as its overarching goal for Taiwan. At the same time, the DPP, as a governing party, has softened its independence rhetoric to embrace the “status quo.” 

Yet Chinese policymakers have been unable to adjust to these new changes, leaving them unable to harness the cultural affinities that exist between Taiwan and the mainland. Instead, Chinese leaders have doubled down on the rhetoric and policy frameworks that undermine any effective application of soft power or seek compromise. This has enflamed nationalism, both in China and across the region, and raises the potential that Chinese policymakers may be “trapped” by their own rhetoric into actions that may lead to violence. 

Nothing new. The real question would be ‘why can’t Leninists do ‘soft power’?’ Clue: soft power is mostly not government-controlled.

From New Scientist – evidence that modern humans reached what is now Shanxi, northern China at least several thousand years earlier than previously thought. Hints that the first homo sapiens got to the region via central Asia and Siberia, rather than from the south.

Some less rigorous work in a laborious Global Times piece intended to back claims that Taiwan is historically Chinese, starting ‘more than 30,000 years ago, during the same period as Peking Man’ and on through the Kingdom of Wu and Sui, Tang and Song dynasties before getting anywhere near modern times. And no mention of the Austronesian aboriginal tribes whose languages – related to Philippine and Malay tongues – are still spoken today. 

Nothing much to do with any of this – Wikipedia entry on one of those eccentric (as in ‘nuts’) Victorian/Edwardian-era women explorers. They don’t make them like this any more.

Recovering from a traumatic trip to Macau. The time in the erstwhile enclave was great; the journeys there and back, fairly horrendous. For example…

So just some quick late midweek links…

Some bureaucrat trying to be ‘creative’ decrees a new font for Hong Kong’s semi-iconic street signs. Such signage serves (obviously) an important purpose. But even if it were purely decorative, you wouldn’t use this nasty typeface. For example, to anyone with poor eyesight, the ‘e’ is indistinguishable from a ‘c’. And – as we all know – san serif is used on road and other signs for a reason: it is clearer. If the government backtracks on one thing this year, it could be this. 

The Guardian on mutual recognition of civil and commercial court judgements…

There is concern that the new ordinance will damage Hong Kong’s reputation as a global wealth management hub. Asset managers may no longer be able to advise wealthy clients with total confidence that their investments would be protected in Hong Kong. “Wealthy Chinese and foreigners alike have been concerned about their personal safety and the security of their assets in Hong Kong, and these judgments will convince many more to move to Asian or western destinations,” [financial research firm boss Andrew] Collier said.

From the CMP’s newsletter, a look at the HK Federation of Journalists, the United Front versio of the HK Journalists Association…

Li Dahong wears many crowns in Hong Kong. As well as chairing the HKFJ, he is the chairman and editor-in-chief of the Ta Kung Wen Wei Media Group, which combines the city’s two biggest state-run newspapers, the Ta Kung Pao and Wen Wei Po. He is also a delegate to the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (中國人民政治協商會議全國委員會), the CCP-led political advisory body. Li is a prominent representative, in other words, of a model of state-led journalism that doesn’t question political power but serves as its megaphone.

…Tellingly, the HKFJ gala dinner on January 17, where John Lee gave media their marching orders, also served as the launch ceremony for a new body in the ACJA’s mold: the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macau Greater Bay Area Media Federation (粵港澳大灣區媒體聯盟). As Li Dahong addressed the crowd, he said in a nod to one of Xi Jinping’s key propaganda phrases that this new mega-group would endeavor to “tell Greater Bay stories well,” and that it would share the HKFJ’s foundational mission “to support the SAR government.”

The (paywalled) Economist looks at changes in Hong Kong’s population…

The demography of Hong Kong (with a population of 7.5m) is changing as the city tries to reverse a brain drain that has seen around 200,000 workers leave in recent years. In 2023 the government lifted strict pandemic controls and announced a slew of new visa schemes. But this “trawl for talent”, as the city’s chief executive, John Lee, calls it, has netted a rather homogenous catch. The city granted just 8,000 visas to Westerners between January and November 2023. Ten times as many went to people from mainland China.

… says a woman who trained as a lawyer in Britain, but moved to the city to work as a financial analyst … “Now all the business and corporate work is Beijing-focused. Singapore is really the hub for international work in Asia.”

…Some residents think that the authorities are actively trying to replace more liberal residents with mainlanders.

Article 23 is here. A four-week public consultation, versus three months last time. HKFP’s report. The Guardian’s. The whole paper. 

Freaky stuff. The phrase ‘soft resistance’ appears once (page 17)…

(d) Promoting messages endangering national security: The forces seeking to endanger the security of our country and the HKSAR have continued to make use of so-called artistic creations released through 16 media like publications, music, films, arts and culture, and online games, etc. as a disguise to disseminate messages that promote resistance against the Central Authorities and the HKSAR Government, advocating “Hong Kong independence” or subvert the State power using a “soft resistance” approach. Given the popular use of the Internet and social messaging applications, such messages can be covertly disseminated in a fast and extensive manner.

While ‘colour revolution’ appears 12 times, eg on pages 18-19…

(g)   Barbaric and gross interference from foreign governments and politicians in China’s internal affairs: Currently, there are unstable factors in the global situation coupled with increasingly complex geopolitics and rising unilateralism. Sovereign equality and non-interference in internal affairs are basic norms of international relations and fundamental principles of international law, which are also entrenched under the Charter of the United Nations7 . However, some external forces have continuously interfered with China’s affairs…

(h)   Grooming of agents by external forces: External forces have groomed agents through long-term infiltration in the HKSAR on all fronts. With significant influence and mobilisation capability, they have been, through their agents, instructing local organisations or individuals to engage in activities endangering national security, improperly influencing the implementation of policies by the HKSAR Government, or collecting intelligence or engaging in other activities endangering national security. Under guises such as so-called “fighting for rights” and “monitoring of human rights”, some external forces have carried out such projects in the HKSAR for a long time and subsidised local organisations to launch various kinds of so-called resistance activities, offering support to the Hong Kong version of “colour revolution”. 

If you have a Twitter account, read the long thread by Galileo Cheung. ‘State secrets officially include economic, social and technological developments’, etc. And a comparison with the 2003 version from Eliot Chen.

From Samuel Bickett…

…the worst case scenario for A23 is [that] it adopts China’s “state secrets” definition, which is the foundation of China’s repressive, secretive regime. Yet that’s exactly what this doc proposes–syncing the definition and scope of state secrets with China’s.

The proposed “state secrets” definition would apply to any documents or information related to “major policy decisions,” “economic and social development,” “technological development or scientific technology,” among others. It is explicitly designed to apply expansively.

What’s more, the state secrets provisions explicitly would require departments to proactively hide information that might be a state secret. We can say goodbye to the open-door policies gov’t bureaucrats have traditionally maintained under the Code on Access to Information.

Just as worrisome, the doc proposes revising the definition of “espionage” to make it apply to colluding with an external force (i.e., any foreigner or, say, a foreign NGO) to “publish a statement of fact that is false or misleading.” Espionage charges–for mere speech.

Separately, the doc also proposes a new offense of “external interference,” which would criminalize “collaborating” with foreigners  to “influence” the government. It’s an extraordinarily broad crime as written, which seemingly prohibits criticizing any government act.

This doc was released as a “consultation,” but other than some possible minor tweaks, it will not change…

HK Rule of Law Monitor fears procedural changes…

They include: extending the period of police detention – this can rule out the availability of bail completely, without any review.

Blocking arrestees from consulting with particular lawyers – given the dwindling no. of lawyers willing to take on the gov, arrestees could be left completely isolated in the jaws of the state.

“Eliminating certain procedures” to ensure “timely trials” – we have seen in #Appledaily and #NSL47 how this is code for pressuring the defence into giving up their rights, while allowing the prosecution every indulgence.

Eliminating remission for ppl convicted of national security offences – meaning they will end up serving a sentence which is one-third LONGER than the same sentence for a non-national security matter.

Act 1 (2020-07 to 2021-10): quash civil society with the #NSL. Act 2 (2021-10 to 2024-01): maintain status quo with the sedition law. Act 3 (2024-01 to -): kill off any semblance of normalcy.

From the FT…

“International business has run into trouble on the mainland, with [businesspeople] detained for suspected state secrets violations,” said John Burns, emeritus professor of politics and public administration at the University of Hong Kong. “Will the same illiberal interpretation of national security characterise Article 23’s implementation?”

“There is a risk that companies’ stakeholders abroad will see this as bringing Hong Kong more closely in line with the mainland at a time when we feel it is important to stress the differences rather than the perceived similarities,” said a foreign chamber of commerce representative in Hong Kong who asked to remain anonymous.

The government’s view comes courtesy of Paul Lam and the Four Necessaries. Ronnie also supports it, though once he didn’t.  Legco is already on board (though no draft bill is yet available).

The government says it welcomes comments (fax 2868 5074). Bear in mind Sam Bickett’s point…

Perversely, even criticizing [the proposed Article 23 law] as part of the “consultation” may violate the existing NSL or sedition law.

…but if you must.

David Webb on the government’s decision not to release the findings of its Task Force on Enhancing Stock Market Liquidity…

…we awaited [the task force members’] report with keen interest. Would they, for example, recognise that the dollar amount of liquidity is a function of company valuations, which in turn reflect the discount applied by investors for the lack of disclosure, lax reporting deadlines, unbounded capital-hoarding, lack of class action rights, fake INEDs elected by controlling shareholders, and so forth? Would they perhaps recognise that racing to the bottom by allowing listings of second-class shares with weaker voting rights was the wrong direction? Would they recognise that introducing a higher-trust framework is the patriotic thing to do, because the resulting higher equity valuations would lower the cost of capital for the nation’s issuers and make the PRC economy more competitive?

…Hong Kong, unfortunately, is back-tracking on disclosure too, and the TFESML report has not been published. So we filed a request for the report under the non-statutory Code On Access To Information (HK still lacks a freedom of information law and a Government archives law). On 23-Jan-2024, the Secretary for Financial Services and the Treasury (via a minion) came back to us, rejecting the request. Their reasons for the rejection, if genuine, should ring alarm bells. 

Also spooking some investors – a Mainland-Hong Kong reciprocal agreement on enforcement of civil and commercial judgements comes into effect… 

“While it is essential to maintain a clear demarcation between the legal system of the Mainland and that of Hong Kong, it is necessary to construct linkages between the two systems so that the unique advantages offered by Hong Kong’s common law system may be fully utilised to serve the national interests of China as a whole,” Lam told an audience of around 200 people at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre.

…Investors have been concerned about the protection of their assets in Hong Kong and the impact of the ordinance on the city’s common law system, according to wealth managers who spoke with Nikkei Asia in December.

But Lam on Monday said there was a need to strike a balance between reciprocal enforcement and the protection of rights, saying that “only judgments obtained properly and fairly will be recognised and enforced [in Hong Kong].”

The Evergrand winding-up case could be a test of this new arrangement, but maybe won’t be (it doesn’t cover bankruptcies)…

Practitioners question whether any decision by Chan in the Evergrande case will be carried out in the mainland. Lawyers told Nikkei Asia that the response by Chinese courts so far suggests the joint insolvency regime will have little long-term impact. One insolvency lawyer described the arrangement as “political goodwill” by Beijing.

Jonathan Leitch, a restructuring partner at Hogan Lovells, said mainland Chinese courts reserve the right to refuse a request from Hong Kong if it would “offend public order or good morals.”

“The PRC (People’s Republic of China) courts have reserved discretion to refuse recognition if the PRC court considers there are ‘other circumstances’ which do not warrant recognition,” Leitch said. “How widely this discretion will be exercised is not really fully known, as there have been relatively few cases where the protocol has been invoked.”

And Eric Yan outlines his expectations of the Article 23 local NatSec law. Key points: a brief consultation period will confirm that there is little scope for amendment; look for confluence with Mainland laws (Anti-Foreign Sanctions, Foreign Relations, Anti-Espionage); look for vague definitions (‘foreign agent’, ‘political organization’); look for restricted due-process and other rights, in breach of international HR conventions. We will find out more today. 

On YouTube, a short BBC News item on what the Jimmy Lai trial shows about press freedom and rule of law in Hong Kong.

Some pointed HKFP items. An op-ed on the ill-fated waste-charging scheme, and another on the government’s plans to raise hospital outpatient fees to reduce demand…

If money is a problem, though, the government could reconsider the arrangement under which Accident and Emergency service is provided absolutely free to civil servants, former civil servants and former civil servants’ spouses.

This would have the added advantage that decisions about raising fees would be made by people who would themselves have to pay them, which always helps.

The basic problem: officials are insulated from the realities of life (housing, schools, public transport, waiting in hospitals) in an unrepresentative political process that enables them to ignore public opinion. Thus only officials of the Beijing-appointed government may organize night vibes, while ordinary folk who know how to do it can be arrested (with occasional leniency to avoid embarrassment)…

The department said officers would adopt specific, more relaxed enforcement strategies for elderly or disabled hawkers, employing a “warning first, then enforcement” mechanism, whereby prosecution would be carried out if verbal warnings were ineffective.

FEHD officers’ confiscation of a licensed 90-year-old street hawker last March drew criticism after videos of the incident circulated widely online. It was reported that she had left her cart with a relative while using the bathroom.

The HK Journalists Association (a non-profit organization) gets hit for profits tax of HK$400,000 for 2017-18…

The HKJA has increasingly been a target of government officials and pro-Beijing media outlets in recent years. State-backed Wen Wei Po in 2021 labelled the association an “anti-government political organisation” which defends “fake news.” There is no evidence the group has defended misinformation.

Secretary for Security Chris Tang also accused the group at the time of “breaching professional ethics” by backing the idea that “everyone is a journalist.” The HKJA said his claims were “factually wrong.”

An example of the HKJA’s anti-government tendencies – complaining about new rules tightening access to public records on vehicles. How long before the Association goes the way of the teachers’ union?

Pro-Beijing figures also incur the wrath. ‘Maverick’ lawmaker Paul Tse criticizes the police for heavy-handed law enforcement – excessive parking tickets at ‘Night Vibes’ events – and the government for failing to explain its planned household waste charging system more effectively. He also suggests that the government puts Mainlanders’ views ahead of Hongkongers’. For his pains, he gets a rebuke from Chief Executive John Lee, who said his phrasing was dangerous, incited conflict and reminded him of 2019-style ‘soft resistance’, and the ‘all patriots’ folk should support one another. 

Should the ‘soft resistance’ accusation make Tse feel threatened?

Standard editorial…

The complaints that Tse made in the Legco chamber were believed to be also shared by a number of other lawmakers.

But who would dare to take them up further after hearing Lee rebuking Tse for speaking the “dangerous” words and nearly accusing him of inciting conflicts by evoking memories of what happened in 2019?

Nonetheless, the chief executive’s rebuttal did contain a rather strong message that even lawmakers are expected to take heed of the “new normal.”

If they continue to think in the “old normal” way, they can expect to be reprimanded – and that is the bottom line.

This week’s brain teaser: You are the HK government and you want to establish a team to ‘fight off smears’ when you roll out the draft Article 23 NatSec Law. Using your skill and judgement, which four top officials do you choose to engage in lobbying? And which three lawmakers will you pick to engage as sexy core members of the oh-so persuasive rebuttal team? Answer right down there at the bottom.

Some weekend reading…

Art Asia Pacific on the un-titling of Zhang Yuan’s Beijing Bastards…

According to a spokesperson at M+, both Zhang and the curatorial team updated the title on the museum website “to highlight the filmmaker’s presence in [the screening program] ‘Once Upon a Time in Beijing’ in the M+ Cinema Winter Edition 2024.” Running until March 2024, the M+ program includes six seminal films that feature Beijing’s rich cultural history, such as Bernardo Bertolucci’s The Last Emperor (1987) and Chen Kaige’s Farewell to My Concubine (1992). Aside from Zhang’s work, the other films all hold their original titles. 

…In the Hong Kong media, some commentators speculated that 雜種 / “zhazhong” (mixed-bred) of the title is a homophone to Chinese leader Xi Jingping’s surname in Cantonese, “zaap.” Other commentators believe that it is the defiant nature of the title, suggesting cultural resistance, that was problematic. While the practice of changing titles to avoid homophones is common in mainland China, it has not been to date in Hong Kong.

Loey Interpreter on how the world treats Taiwan…

Rather than this being China’s power over Taiwan, it is actually the power China has over the rest of us. The way we exclude Taiwan from being a normal country in order to placate Beijing is our own indignity. It is how we refuse to treat China as an adult, far too concerned with its feet stamping and emotional outbursts. Alongside this sits a betrayal of the Taiwanese people – how we ask them to carry the burden of limiting themselves to protect the world from any Chinese aggression.

A brief description of Anne Stevenson-Yang’s forthcoming book Wild Ride.

Some level-headed commentary on the St Pancras Station, London public piano weirdness…

Overall, Kavanaugh was shrewd in his responses, taking the high road of making light of it and keeping calm, even if he was slyly playing to his camera and knew the whole while this sort of thing was gold for his live stream business model.

As the event unfolded, Kavanaugh was in communion with his fan base, while his accusers, perhaps feeling isolated and out of their element in London despite many years’ residence, lost their tempers and lost all perspective.

The way they acted was as if they were physically in London but psychically in Beijing, trying to produce something that would be a hit back home on CCTV, if it was CCTV they were freelancing for.

Under this self-imposed pressure, they lost their manners and rudely repeated the demands of their undisclosed employer that everything be kept secret until broadcast. It was the secret pact with Beijing that put them on a collision course with the freewheeling, live-streaming pianist in London.

The piano back in use.

Another recent hissy fit in a teacup concerns an Economist cover portraying the world being bombarded with Chinese-made electric vehicles. China Media Project looks at the state media’s reaction…

Certainly, Western headline writers could walk more in step with the content of the articles on their platforms. But by judging a magazine by its cover, state media have only discredited a story that — had they quoted it instead — might have served the talking points of the Chinese government, arguing that Western countries, now gripped by fear of Chinese EV imports, should keep their markets open. 

The Council on Geostrategy on Beijing’s conflicts with the UN Law of the Sea Convention.

From HKFP – an interview with Hong Kong’s leading expert on those adorable but noisy yellow-crested cockatoos. (An actual ‘good Hong Kong story’.)

Weekly brain teaser answer (from the Standard): 

Secretary for Justice Paul Lam Ting-kwok and Secretary for Security Chris Tang Ping-keung will be core lobbying officials. Chief Secretary Eric Chan Kwok-ki and Financial Secretary Paul Chan Mo-po will be involved in supporting roles.

Additionally, three lawmakers – Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee and Lai Tung-kwok from the New People’s Party as well as Starry Lee Wai-king from the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong – have been named as core members of the team responsible for rebuttal efforts.

Prosecution witness in Jimmy Lai trial…

Former media tycoon Jimmy Lai sought to paint China in a negative light in Apple Daily’s English edition so the United States would take hostile actions against Beijing, an ex-senior executive of the now-defunct outlet told Lai’s national security trial on Wednesday.

…“Lai felt that the Chinese Communist Party regime was suppressing human rights, covering up [issues] and lacking integrity, so he hoped to portray this image to foreign readers,” he said.

The defendant hoped that the English edition could “influence public opinion in the United States and thus create an impact on American politics,” in order for Washington to take hostile actions such as sanctions, to “protect Hong Kong and Apple Daily”, the court heard.

UN human rights experts…

“We are alarmed by the multiple and serious violations of Jimmy Lai’s freedom of expression, peaceful assembly, and association, and his right to a fair trial, including the denial of access to a lawyer of his own choosing and the handpicking of judges by the authorities,” the experts said.

More ‘smearing’ of Hong Kong from the Guardian, which visited M+ and the West Kowloon Cultural Hub-Zone…

Herzog & de Meuron decided to dig, taking an “archeological” approach, unearthing an unlikely gift in the form of the Airport Express train tunnel, cutting diagonally beneath the site. “It was like discovering the body of a huge animal,” says Herzog. “It gave us the impulse to create a kind of underworld, which is mysterious and strange – and so Hong Kong.”

…The architects describe it as “a space of unprecedented potential”, and it has so far staged some dangling installations. But it was empty on my visit, and curators confide that they struggle to find ways to use it. 

And it’s difficult to get to…

The nearest metro station is across a bridge, up and down several escalators, in the bowels of a shopping mall whose operators clearly prefer people to get lost in their retail labyrinth rather than find their way to the museum. Once you emerge, you are greeted with the blank concrete silo of M+’s conservation and storage building, a later addition to the brief whose lower floors are leased to the Phillips auction house, so it is their gigantic logo you see first, not the museum’s.

The nearest bus stop, meanwhile, drops you on the edge of an eight-lane highway from where you must tackle a 20-minute obstacle course of bridges and underpasses. Finally, coming by car (which, strangely for such a public transport-oriented city, was the recommended option) leaves you in an unprepossessing undercroft, as if you’re coming to service the boiler. Even arriving on foot presents challenges: the building is so big and “permeable”, with entrances on all sides, that the museum cannot staff all its doors, so many remain locked. A dedicated ferry service, opening later this year, should hopefully provide a more seamless arrival.

Coming by car is the ‘recommended option’ – in a city where 90% of households do not have one (and are not car-owning planner-bureaucrats who design everything for themselves). The writer concludes with the phrase ‘a motley hotchpotch of architectural misfits, marooned on the waterfront’. And he didn’t even get to the Cruise Terminal or the Zhuhai Bridge.

Beijing’s attempts to prop up China’s falling stock market fail to impress – from Bloomberg…

China’s history of botched market rescue efforts, the grim state of its economy, and uncertainties over Beijing’s long-term policy roadmap are keeping investors skeptical about the sustainability of these gains.

…“Xi Jinping’s people are almost certainly telling him that the rout in the equity market is a stability risk,” said George Magnus, a research associate at Oxford University’s China Centre. “Investors aren’t just abandoning Chinese stocks for normal reasons of valuation, but because the whole economic policy and political environment has atrophied. Getting confidence back probably requires major changes in both.”

…[Previous efforts suggest] that throwing money at the market as Beijing appears willing to do, while economic woes lie unresolved, will only embolden traders to sell into what may at best be a bear-market rally.

Howard French – always worth reading – in FP…

Xi is not just ideologically hostile to the creation of more generous health, retirement, and unemployment systems. The real problem is that China has waited this long to grapple with these issues in the first place. Beijing was slow to take aging and population decline seriously, putting them off until they could no longer remotely be denied and then all but panicking. The country is suddenly now awash in campaigns urging young people to create bigger families, and these are unlikely to work.

…[Beijing’s dilemma] looms as an increasingly excruciating choice between guns and butter … China saw the present period as a window of opportunity that was bound to close. Beijing hoped to use this window to make big geopolitical advances and lock them in through a combination of impressive economic growth and extraordinary military modernization before the costs unavoidably associated with aging forced it to switch direction and prioritize social needs at home.

Signs of this strategy can be found nearly everywhere one looks, from China’s muscling into the seas of the Western Pacific, where it has rebuffed its neighbors’ territorial claims while building artificial islands that host military outposts, to its enormous capital expenditures on the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). Now in something of a retreat, the BRI is the program through which China has invested massively in infrastructure projects throughout Eurasia and other regions of the world.

HKFP turns pitches that got nowhere into a news item with maybe a dash of ‘soft resistance’ –  the challenges involved in telling good Hong Kong stories. Even the sewage works rejected a request for a photo feature. Interesting to compare and contrast the wording of different government departments’ rejections of requests to do a story. Some use similarly abrupt, almost frosty, phrasing, while others come across as semi-friendly. Sesame Street today was brought to you by the word ‘accede’.

(I once had the pleasure of visiting a sewage treatment facility, though not in Hong Kong. On a patch of windswept wasteland next to the conveyer belt carrying dried solid waste was an impressive patch of tomato plants.) 

Some mid-week reading…

Courtesy of a commenter yesterday – a fund manager who picked the wrong time to short the Nikkei and stay long on Hong Kong/China…

Chua Soon Hock’s Asia Genesis Macro Fund had a drawdown of 18.8 per cent in the first weeks of January, according to a letter sent to investors seen by Bloomberg News. The fund is returning money to investors after losses on long Hong Kong and China equities positions as well as short Nikkei bets, according to the letter.

“I have reached the stage whereby my confidence as a trader is lost,” chief investment officer Chua wrote in the letter. Tough trading since October and a “disastrous” January “have proven that my past experience is no longer valid and instead, is working against me”.

…Chua said that the fund made a “big mistake” in trying to pick the bottom of benchmark Hong Kong indexes. He was also “astounded” with the Nikkei-Hang Seng spread that priced Chinese and Japanese stocks at the same value as in 1991.

…“I have lost my knowledge, trading and psychological edge,” Chua added, “The principle of risk-reward for both the short term and long term has turned its head.”

You gambled. 

More from Asia Times…

“I still do not understand the inconsistency of China policymakers’ not fighting against deflation, leading to continued loss of market confidence and prolonged bear market,” [Chua] wrote in the letter.

…Hu Xijin, a “patriotic” political commentator and the former editor-in-chief of the Global Times, tried to boost people’s confidence in the stock markets by buying A-shares with his own money.

Initially, the newbie injected 100,000 yuan in his investment account last June, and gradually invested the amount to 480,000 yuan.

On Monday, when the Shanghai Composite Index fell 2.7% to 2,754, the lowest since April 2020, Hu said he felt sad that he lost 10,444 yuan in a single day. He said he has so far suffered a loss of 71,024 yuan, or 17.4% of his money. 

…Lau Kwan-ming, a Hong Kong financial writer, said in an article on January 16 that once US and European stock markets had started to correct from current high levels, the Hang Seng Index likely would drop farther, perhaps to as low as 12,000. 

SCMP op-ed…

…many of the cracks Beijing pledged to fix eight-plus years ago remain below the surface. And they spook investors in ways that will keep shares under downward pressure in the months ahead.

These cracks include: extreme opacity, the continued dominance of state-owned enterprises, weak corporate governance, regulatory uncertainty, a feeble credit rating system and a Communist Party more focused on the symptoms of China’s troubles than the underlying ailments.

…Think of the plunge in Chinese stocks as a giant ticking clock. It’s expressing how investors wonder less about what Beijing will do and how, but when officials will prioritise economic reforms. Time isn’t on Beijing’s side in 2024.

China Media Project on why Chinese state media said so little to its domestic audience about ‘internal affair’ Taiwan’s elections…

How do we account for this dichotomy? The stiff poker face in Chinese, and the snarling wolf warrior in English? In fact, these varying reactions, which have played out in the past for international stories China’s leadership regards as highly sensitive, offer a glimpse at how state media handle sharply differing priorities for domestic and international audiences. 

While China insists Taiwan is an internal affair, and that the rest of the world should simply keep its nose out, the bulk of the coverage of the elections in state media was directed externally, at foreign readers. Internally, silence reigned.

Nikkei op-ed on the Philippine government’s ties with Taiwan…

With Taiwan the leading player in semiconductor production, the Philippines is angling for a large place in Taiwan-centered supply-chains. Specifically, Manila has the potential to play a bigger role in chip packaging and testing, and then perhaps to move on to higher-value-added segments.

Overall, the Marcos administration senses a historic opportunity to maximize relations with its highly industrialized northern neighbor while also building closer security ties with the U.S., which could help deter Chinese aggression.

This strategy is already annoying Beijing, but Marcos has put a higher priority on defending Philippine territory against Chinese expansionism and has concluded that China will not provide that much economic support anyway. Polls show a majority of Filipinos are on board for this new course.

And RFE on Beijing’s headache as two key partners – Iran and Pakistan – come to blows.

…the Hang Seng Index is below 15,000.

The Law Society finds that some of its members engaged in professional misconduct owing to links with the 612 Humanitarian Relief Fund. The Bar Association, on the other hand, clears its members accused of the same thing. What I don’t understand is why the police made the original complaints. If the lawyers were suspected of committing crimes, the cops would presumably arrest them. Since when have the police been a legal-profession watchdog?

A couple more HKFP items worth reading: an interview with journalist Bao Choy, and an interesting op-ed on how universities are (or should be) run.

That’s it – I’m switching the heater on.