China is tightening its grip on Hong Kong. We should have seen it coming GlobeDebate
On Friday, on the first day of its annual week-long session, China’s parliament, the National People’s Congress unveiled a draft of legislation called “Decision on Establishing and Improving the Legal Systems and Implementation Mechanisms for Safeguarding National Security in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.” That’s a fairly anodyne name for a national-security law that will allow China to significantly tighten its grip on Hong Kong.
Some experts suggest the NPC’s legislation will also enable arbitrary detention. “Their promised ‘enforcement mechanisms’ can be relied upon to eliminate dissent in Hong Kong almost as efficiently as they have done on the Mainland,” Jerome A. Cohen, a New York University professor and authority on Chinese law, wrote ominously on his blog.
But what is happening now was foreshadowed as far back as last October, when the Communist Party of China held a plenary session of its Central Committee. The communique issued at the time said the party would “build and improve a legal system and enforcement mechanism to defend national security” in Hong Kong.
When Mr. Kwok accused them of violating the Basic Law by interfering in Hong Kong’s internal affairs, the two offices claimed to be extensions of the central government with the right to supervise affairs in Hong Kong. Chief Executive Carrie Lam leaped to their defence.
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