{"id":73556,"date":"2022-07-04T06:00:37","date_gmt":"2022-07-03T20:00:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/?p=73556"},"modified":"2022-07-02T15:41:22","modified_gmt":"2022-07-02T05:41:22","slug":"xis-anniversary-visit-marks-near-total-ccp-control-of-hong-kong","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/xis-anniversary-visit-marks-near-total-ccp-control-of-hong-kong\/","title":{"rendered":"Xi\u2019s anniversary visit marks near-total CCP control of Hong Kong"},"content":{"rendered":"
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If norms exist in the Chinese Communist Party, perhaps Xi Jinping, the general secretary and de facto president of the People\u2019s Republic of China, has established one by attending the inauguration of incoming chief executives. He last came to Hong Kong five years ago when Carrie Lam took up the post.<\/p>\n

But his visit, whose length did not match the three days of 2017, perhaps from a fear of Covid-19 or a need to concentrate on mitigating its economic and social consequences on the mainland, has deeper significance.<\/p>\n

For Xi himself, it is an opportunity to bang the nationalist and patriotic drums in this important year when he intends to continue for a third term in the trinity of top party, army and state posts. This reminder to the Chinese people that the CCP ended the \u2018century of foreign humiliation\u2019, which began with the ceding of Hong Kong to Britain, portrays Xi as the embodiment of the CCP\u2019s success.<\/p>\n

For others, the 25th anniversary is significant as a halfway milestone to 2047. Before the 1997 handover of Hong Kong, Deng Xiaoping, then paramount leader of the PRC, had promised \u201850 years no change\u2019 (\u4e94\u5341\u5e74\u4e0d\u53d8) as reassurance that his policy of \u2018one country, two systems\u2019 would allow Hong Kong\u2019s freedoms to continue and remain different from those on the mainland.<\/p>\n

So, where does Hong Kong stand 25 years after the handover?<\/p>\n

The answer is not where the people of Hong Kong and the British government hoped back in 1997. At best Hong Kong experiences \u2018one country, one and a half systems\u2019. \u201850 years no change\u2019 was always a way of papering over unresolved differences or worries. The hope was that, by 2047, the PRC would have changed, and thus the gap with the Hong Kong system would have narrowed. Indeed the CCP has changed\u2014for the worse\u2014and the gap between past rhetoric and present reality has widened.<\/p>\n

Every five years or so since 1997 the clash between Hong Kong\u2019s and Beijing\u2019s interpretation of \u2018one country, two systems\u2019 boiled over into protest. The issues were unsurprising: national security legislation (2003); national education (2012); electoral system (2014); and extradition arrangements, which then led to wider unrest (2019).<\/p>\n

The wide scale demonstrations and street violence of 2019 convinced the CCP that its three \u2018red lines<\/a>\u2019\u2014no harm to national security, no challenge to the central government\u2019s authority and the ‘basic law\u2019, and no using Hong Kong as a base to undermine the PRC\u2014had been crossed. In essence, they embodied the fear that Hong Kong\u2019s protests and values might spill over into neighbouring Guangdong province and provoke unrest. The spear point of the CCP\u2019s response was the national security law, or NSL, which came into force on 1 July 2020. The NSL centred on four crimes: secession from the PRC, subversion, terrorism and collusion with foreign forces. Their definitions are elastic\u2014intentionally\u2014and their enforcement ubiquitous. Currently, around 150 people are awaiting trial.<\/p>\n

While maintaining the slogan of \u2018one country, two systems\u2019, the CCP has reached into its traditional playbook for ensuring control. No self-respecting and aspiring totalitarian regime can afford to ignore:<\/p>\n