In June this year, Beijing released a white paper entitled The Practice of the ‘One Country, Two Systems’ Policy in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.
It spelled the death of the “one country, two systems” policy and a “high degree of autonomy” for Hong Kong.
On Aug. 31, the Standing Committee of the Chinese National People’s Congress announced Beijing’s decisions on universal suffrage in Hong Kong, and the following day Hong Kongers gathered in a protest, prominently displaying the Chinese characters for “civil disobedience” on the main stage.
On the same day, the Taiwan-based New School for Democracy and another 20 Taiwanese civic groups held an international press conference to show their joint support for Hong Kong’s Alliance for True Democracy.
During the event, Hong Kong City University political science professor and convenor of the Alliance for True Democracy Joseph Cheng (鄭宇碩), and University of Hong Kong Faculty of Arts student and Hong Kong Federation of Students (HKFS) secretary-general Alex Chow Yong Kang (周永康) participated via video conferencing.
During the conversation Chow said: “In the future, Hong Kong’s younger generations will never again believe in talk about one country, two systems, a high degree of autonomy for Hong Kong or Hong Kong people ruling Hong Kong, nor will they talk about the return of democracy anymore.”
“What they will talk about is determining their own fate, that the people of Hong Kong will decide their future for themselves,” Chow said.
In other words, Hong Kong’s young people will never again place their faith in Beijing. They will follow their own path and decide their own future, Chow added.
The HKFS and Scholarism, another student activist group, have both been active in Hong Kong’s civic movements pushing for universal suffrage.
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) tends to exercise more self-control when dealing with students to avoid making itself look bad, but in the end, the party could not help itself from lashing out.
As the members of Scholarism are only high-school students, it would not look good if the CCP attacked them, so instead it chose to come down on members of the HKFS, who are tertiary students, and the CCP-led media have referred to them using derogatory names.
Over the past few days, Chow’s talk of deciding one’s own fate has been attacked by left-wing newspapers as representing “Hong Kong Independence.” Are Hong Kongers really just meant to be slaves of the CCP?
What is more, self-determination is a basic human right as outlined in the UN Charter.
The UK government is preparing for a referendum to decide whether Scotland should be an independent country — due to take place on Thursday.
Like the UK, China is also a permanent member of the UN Security Council, so how should they be punished for openly acting against the UN Charter?
Civil disobedience is not necessarily the only way to independence, nor will Chow’s talk about Hong Kongers deciding their own future lead to the territory’s independence. It is simply a matter of promoting peaceful and rational non-cooperation.
As well as protesting in the streets, on Sept. 3, a Hong Kong cartoonist who goes by the alias “White Water” posted a cartoon on Facebook showing nine ways that Hong Kongers could boycott Chinese products: not using banks invested in by China, boycotting products from Chinese electronic companies, refusing to use Chinese social media Web sites and software, not buying shares in Chinese companies mainly operating in China but incorporated overseas, not traveling to China, not using China Mobile’s services, not buying Chinese electronic goods, not watching Chinese television programs and not drinking Tsingtao Beer.
Before 1997, some of my friends in Hong Kong had already started refusing to purchase clothing made by the company of businessman and “patriotic monster” Tsang Hin-chi (曾憲梓).
If “patriotic” businesspeople or media outlets in the territory start making unreasonable statements, the boycott could be expanded to include these outlets.
If the CCP continues its oppression in the territory, the sense of a distinctively local Hong Kong identity will only grow stronger among Hong Kongers.
Taiwanese can also start to resist China in their own lives by saying no to the CCP.
For example, they could choose not to purchase products made in China and consider boycotting shares in and products made by Taiwanese companies close to President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and his confidantes, just as they boycotted HTC’s products when HTC Corp chairwoman Cher Wang (王雪紅) made inappropriate statements. From here, the desinicization can be further expanded.
Paul Lin is a political commentator.
Translated by Drew Cameron
Because much of what former US president Donald Trump says is unhinged and histrionic, it is tempting to dismiss all of it as bunk. Yet the potential future president has a populist knack for sounding alarums that resonate with the zeitgeist — for example, with growing anxiety about World War III and nuclear Armageddon. “We’re a failing nation,” Trump ranted during his US presidential debate against US Vice President Kamala Harris in one particularly meandering answer (the one that also recycled urban myths about immigrants eating cats). “And what, what’s going on here, you’re going to end up in World War
Earlier this month in Newsweek, President William Lai (賴清德) challenged the People’s Republic of China (PRC) to retake the territories lost to Russia in the 19th century rather than invade Taiwan. He stated: “If it is for the sake of territorial integrity, why doesn’t [the PRC] take back the lands occupied by Russia that were signed over in the treaty of Aigun?” This was a brilliant political move to finally state openly what many Chinese in both China and Taiwan have long been thinking about the lost territories in the Russian far east: The Russian far east should be “theirs.” Granted, Lai issued
On Tuesday, President William Lai (賴清德) met with a delegation from the Hoover Institution, a think tank based at Stanford University in California, to discuss strengthening US-Taiwan relations and enhancing peace and stability in the region. The delegation was led by James Ellis Jr, co-chair of the institution’s Taiwan in the Indo-Pacific Region project and former commander of the US Strategic Command. It also included former Australian minister for foreign affairs Marise Payne, influential US academics and other former policymakers. Think tank diplomacy is an important component of Taiwan’s efforts to maintain high-level dialogue with other nations with which it does
On Sept. 2, Elbridge Colby, former deputy assistant secretary of defense for strategy and force development, wrote an article for the Wall Street Journal called “The US and Taiwan Must Change Course” that defends his position that the US and Taiwan are not doing enough to deter the People’s Republic of China (PRC) from taking Taiwan. Colby is correct, of course: the US and Taiwan need to do a lot more or the PRC will invade Taiwan like Russia did against Ukraine. The US and Taiwan have failed to prepare properly to deter war. The blame must fall on politicians and policymakers