Critical commentary and analysis on Hong Kong, China and Taiwan affairs from HKFP’s community of columnists, experts and advocates.
Even with the Nobel Peace Prize, press freedom remains under fierce attack
The award of this year’s Nobel Peace Prize to two journalists, Maria Ressa from the Philippines and Russia’s Dmitry Muratov, for their work to “safeguard freedom of expression, which is a precondition for democracy and lasting peace,” is a recognition of the efforts of all those journalists who face threats, arrest, and even death. Ressa,…
Forget the ‘small minority,’ the national security law has silenced Hong Kong society
There was a reception last month for the “media sector.” This gave a little foretaste of what the media sector is likely to consist of when the national security police have finished pruning it. Organisers included Patrick Li, who has presided over the obedience training at RTHK, a bigwig from the Ta Kung Wen Wei…
China’s leftist prophet Li Guangman speaks again
Last month, a blog article declaring China to be in the midst of a “profound revolution” fuelled speculation online after it was republished by several Party-state media outlets. In the comparatively moderate intellectual climate of the 1990s or early 2000s, such a leftist screed, with its talk of a “red return,” would have been beneath the notice…
Time for Hong Kong to get serious: you can’t tackle the climate crisis AND build mega-towns
The way humans deal with the climate crisis is one of the strangest examples of our complicated psychology. For example: this has been one of the hottest-ever summers in Hong Kong, and on October 5, the government issued a press release stating that September 2021 was the hottest on record, a full 2.3 degrees warmer…
The Tiananmen Massacre statue and the purging of Hong Kong
A nightmarish eight-metre-high tangerine-coloured cenotaph composed of intertwined naked bodies with hands outreached and mouths agape, the Pillar of Shame was never a subtle symbol. Today, however, it is truly performing its identity, heaping shame upon shame as the university that has housed it for a quarter of a century demands its removal. Yet the…
Hong Kong’s Carrie Lam and the district councils: Forked tongue or poor memory?
It would be nice if a government proposing to legislate against “fake news” was itself scrupulously truthful. Nice, but perhaps a bit too much to hope for. Consider the latest exchanges on this topic between a reporter and our Chief Executive, Carrie Lam. “The reporter … asked whether rumours that district councillors who were disqualified…
Patriots at the helm: Hong Kong’s new election committee assembles to begin its work
After the imposition of a new National Security Law on June 30, 2020, Beijing’s election reform mandate issued earlier this year marked the next major change in Hong Kong’s way of political life. Before the new law and the mandate, Hong Kongers had been carrying on along the course laid down when the British left…
The University of Hong Kong must cherish its autonomy and protect the Tiananmen Massacre statue
This week, I walked past the memorial at the University of Hong Kong to those who lost their lives in the June 4, 1989, incident in Beijing, Jens Galschiøt’s Pillar of Shame. University authorities have ordered its removal by next Wednesday, despite it being in an area that was once reserved for HKU Student Union…
Hong Kong’s security chief – the most dangerous person in town?
Who is the most dangerous person in Hong Kong today? No, it’s not the 15-year-old girl locked up this month and denied bail for allegedly inciting subversion. And it’s not any one of her three 16-year-old supposed partners in crime, charged with the same offence. Perhaps it once was Jimmy Lai Chee-ying, the founder of…
Why did Hong Kong need 8,000 police to help it celebrate National Day?
Unless I am very much mistaken, it has been decreed that the anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China is supposed to be a joyous occasion with much to celebrate. Why then in Hong Kong was it necessary to mobilise some 8,000 police officers to maintain order and prevent any unwarranted manifestations…
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