On Tuesday last week, the Italian senate introduced a motion calling on the Italian government to act through international institutions to protect the rights of Next Digital founder Jimmy Lai (黎智英), as well as those of pro-democracy activists imprisoned in Hong Kong. Lai has been held in solitary confinement since 2020 on charges of “sedition” and “collusion with foreign powers” under Hong Kong’s National Security Law.
With this initiative, Italy joins similar efforts by parliamentary bodies in the US, the UK and Australia, as well as the European Parliament urging Chinese authorities to release Lai on humanitarian grounds.
The motion followed a news conference at the Italian senate on Oct. 27 by Italian Senator Giulio Terzi to draw attention to the forthcoming verdict in Lai’s trial. There is a real risk that Lai could be sentenced to life imprisonment — a terrifying prospect given his serious health conditions, which have worsened during his detention, his lawyer said.
Participants in the news conference stressed the destructive impact of the censorship imposed by Hong Kong authorities on the “one country, two systems” principle, which was meant to safeguard the autonomy guaranteed by the 1984 Sino-British Joint Declaration.
In its World Press Freedom Index this year, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) ranked Hong Kong 140th out of 180 countries and territories. It ranked 135th last year, 80th in 2020, 70th in 2015 and 18th in 2002 — the first year of the RSF report. This year’s assessment says: “Once a bastion of press freedom, the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People’s Republic of China has suffered a series of unprecedented setbacks since 2020, when Beijing adopted a National Security Law aimed at silencing independent voices.”
At the EU-China summit in July, the EU reiterated its deep concern over the ongoing erosion of fundamental freedoms in Hong Kong, where China should honor its previous commitments, as well as the human rights situation in Xinjiang and Tibet, and the treatment of human rights defenders and minority groups. The European Parliament has repeatedly emphasized the importance of maintaining the “status quo” in the Taiwan Strait.
One of the speakers at the conference was Lai’s son, Sebastien. In his remarks, Sebastien Lai referred to Taiwan, saying that in its past two presidential elections Taiwanese chose the Democratic Progressive Party candidates precisely because they had witnessed events in Hong Kong. For many in Taiwan, Hong Kong was the testing ground for the “one country, two systems” model often invoked in discussions about Taiwan — and the place where that promise was broken.
The motion to free Jimmy Lai is not only a call to liberate a man who has defended freedom of speech, freedom of the press and freedom of assembly; it is also an appeal to China to act responsibly, foster peace in the Taiwan Strait and ease international tensions.
Matteo Angioli is secretary general of the Global Committee for the Rule of Law “Marco Pannella.”
Chinese state-owned companies COSCO Shipping Corporation and China Merchants have a 30 percent stake in Kaohsiung Port’s Kao Ming Container Terminal (Terminal No. 6) and COSCO leases Berths 65 and 66. It is extremely dangerous to allow Chinese companies or state-owned companies to operate critical infrastructure. Deterrence theorists are familiar with the concepts of deterrence “by punishment” and “by denial.” Deterrence by punishment threatens an aggressor with prohibitive costs (like retaliation or sanctions) that outweigh the benefits of their action, while deterrence by denial aims to make an attack so difficult that it becomes pointless. Elbridge Colby, currently serving as the Under
The Ministry of the Interior on Thursday last week said it ordered Internet service providers to block access to Chinese social media platform Xiaohongshu (小紅書, also known as RedNote in English) for a year, citing security risks and more than 1,700 alleged fraud cases on the platform since last year. The order took effect immediately, abruptly affecting more than 3 million users in Taiwan, and sparked discussions among politicians, online influencers and the public. The platform is often described as China’s version of Instagram or Pinterest, combining visual social media with e-commerce, and its users are predominantly young urban women,
Most Hong Kongers ignored the elections for its Legislative Council (LegCo) in 2021 and did so once again on Sunday. Unlike in 2021, moderate democrats who pledged their allegiance to Beijing were absent from the ballots this year. The electoral system overhaul is apparent revenge by Beijing for the democracy movement. On Sunday, the Hong Kong “patriots-only” election of the LegCo had a record-low turnout in the five geographical constituencies, with only 1.3 million people casting their ballots on the only seats that most Hong Kongers are eligible to vote for. Blank and invalid votes were up 50 percent from the previous
Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi lit a fuse the moment she declared that trouble for Taiwan means trouble for Japan. Beijing roared, Tokyo braced and like a plot twist nobody expected that early in the story, US President Donald Trump suddenly picked up the phone to talk to her. For a man who normally prefers to keep Asia guessing, the move itself was striking. What followed was even more intriguing. No one outside the room knows the exact phrasing, the tone or the diplomatic eyebrow raises exchanged, but the broad takeaway circulating among people familiar with the call was this: Trump did
RSS