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National Security Law - Passed - 30th June 2020

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  1. #81
    Quote Originally Posted by john_1122:
    Methinks they won't do anything for a while, maybe a week or two or a month, until the rest of the world stops looking, and then there will be knocks at night, and several (i.e. tens) activists, journalists, politicians will be rounded up never to be seen again. The rest of the world won't really care, because they want to keep selling to China. Then it will be any (i.e. thousands) young person who ever participated in a protest, to be send to reeducation camps in the mainland.
    The lack of retroactivity in the law seems to suggest they may wait for people to be lulled into a false sense of security and do something that challenges its terms, or to provoke a reaction, however long that takes. In the meantime, they can just enjoy everyone's self-censorship. Journalists may also be "safe" thanks to the "guidance" they receive effectively preventing them from doing anything that might violate the law anyway.

  2. #82

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    Quote Originally Posted by prospectiveHKer:
    This seems intended to create an atmosphere of fear more than anything. The text of the law requires a connection between "inciting hatred" and "foreign groups," at least. Not to say such connections couldn't be made up, but he seems to be misconstruing the contents of the text.

    Of course maybe he's referring to a situation in which the mainland exercises jurisdiction, but it's hard to imagine they're going to exercise that every time someone criticizes the police. After all, they put a whole local apparatus into operation, presumably for the minor stuff.
    https://twitter.com/XinqiSu/s...62358397886464

    Or they could just want the window dressing.

  3. #83

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    Original Post Deleted
    Shout in English - the police wont understand?

  4. #84
    Quote Originally Posted by AsianXpat0:
    https://twitter.com/XinqiSu/s...62358397886464

    Or they could just want the window dressing.
    The tiniest differences between the systems may be all that HK has left to hold on to, so it's important to try and figure out what they are. The "window dressing" still might mean the difference, on many occasions, between a jury trial in HK and a secret trial on the mainland.

  5. #85

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    Quote Originally Posted by prospectiveHKer:
    The lack of retroactivity in the law seems to suggest they may wait for people to be lulled into a false sense of security and do something that challenges its terms, or to provoke a reaction, however long that takes. In the meantime, they can just enjoy everyone's self-censorship. Journalists may also be "safe" thanks to the "guidance" they receive effectively preventing them from doing anything that might violate the law anyway.
    It seems to me that the law is so broad, they can arrest anybody on any flimsy excuse and put them in prison for life. E.g. you are queuing at the MTR station: you are disrupting public transportation which equals terrorism and life imprisonment. You post a message on a foreign website, you are colluding with foreigners which equals terrorism and life imprisonment.

    Thousands of people have been arrested, and they can just make up whatever excuse to give them life. Plus, trials will be closed door and all judges will be sent here by the mainland. They don't even have to come up with a reason.
    AsianXpat0 likes this.

  6. #86

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    Quote Originally Posted by prospectiveHKer:
    The tiniest differences between the systems may be all that HK has left to hold on to, so it's important to try and figure out what they are. The "window dressing" still might mean the difference, on many occasions, between a jury trial in HK and a secret trial on the mainland.
    I think you may be failing to appreciate that the words don’t matter. They mean whatever they want it to mean. You are expected to terrorise yourself into silent submission, or otherwise bravely go about your business under a potential cloud in future. They would never draw a clear line that constrains themselves both because they want the freedom for arbitrariness, as well as create the fear factor.

    The window dressing I’m talking about is trying to keep up the fiction. You’re an optimist in thinking that it extends to actual practice.
    Coolboy, john_1122 and Baklava like this.

  7. #87

  8. #88

  9. #89
    Quote Originally Posted by AsianXpat0:
    I think you may be failing to appreciate that the words don’t matter. They mean whatever they want it to mean. You are expected to terrorise yourself into silent submission, or otherwise bravely go about your business under a potential cloud in future. They would never draw a clear line that constrains themselves both because they want the freedom for arbitrariness, as well as create the fear factor.

    The window dressing I’m talking about is trying to keep up the fiction. You’re an optimist in thinking that it extends to actual practice.
    This is all true to an extent but it was also true they could have always added this law to Annex III, and so "could do whatever they wanted" then. In fact, they took actions like kidnappings entirely contrary to law anyway. Yet at no point did anyone claim that the CCP had total control over HK. I think words mattered somewhat before and will continue to matter somewhat now.

    Here's an example: let's say you committed some violation of the NSL and the mainland authorities decline to exercise jurisdiction over you because you're not a big enough fish for them to care about. This means you wind up entirely in the HK court system, with whatever charges against you weighed against the specific text of the law and caselaw that's developed beforehand. You may even have the benefit of a jury and the press scrutinizing your case.

    Is it as airtight a system of protections as before? Of course not. But you're not guaranteed to face arbitrary justice in the same way as in Shanghai. Is that only a small comfort? Yes, that is all I'm saying.

  10. #90

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    The US's official response, as posted on the US consulate in HK:

    https://hk.usconsulate.gov/n-2020063001/

    The United States will not stand idly by while China swallows Hong Kong into its authoritarian maw. Last week, we imposed visa restrictions on CCP officials responsible for undermining Hong Kong’s autonomy. We are ending defense and dual-use technology exports to the territory. Per President Trump’s instruction, we will eliminate policy exemptions that give Hong Kong different and special treatment, with few exceptions...

    Empty political bluffing or is there real teeth to this statement? We'll see. No doubt China will retaliate. And so the tit-for-tat will go on and get worse.


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