Tuesday, 28 September 2021

Photo: Shanghai Bus, by Bowen LI

Shanghai Bus, by Bowen LI (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)



source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2021/09/photo-shanghai-bus-by-bowen-li/
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Photo: 26911-Harbin, by Xiquinho Silva



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Netizen Voices: Coal Costs, Climate Commitments and Competing Priorities Inform China’s Latest Power Outages

Power outages and blackouts across twenty Chinese provinces have forced factories to slow production and disrupted daily life for millions of residents. Power supply shortages are being driven by rising coal prices and increased demand for electricity; they also coincide with President Xi Jinping’s international and domestic climate commitments, which include reducing China’s reliance on coal. Among the worst-hit are Chinese factories in highly energy-intensive industries such as steel, concrete and aluminum; U.S. and European importers of those products; and ordinary citizens who have suddenly found themselves without power. Yuan Ye and Zhang Wanqing at Sixth Tone delved into the root of the problem:

The current electricity crisis, of a scale China hasn’t seen since 2011, has been building since June and is caused by an unbalanced coal market and policies that aim to improve energy efficiency and reduce emissions.

The cost of coal, the dominant source of power generation in China, has risen sharply mainly due to increased international and domestic demand and suspensions of Chinese coal mining operations amid tightening environmental regulations.

But the price of electricity is largely inflexible, creating a situation where power plants are losing more money the more electricity they generate, Yuan Jiahai, professor at North China Electric Power University, told Sixth Tone. “For every kilowatt-hour of electricity, the coal-fired power generators could lose 0.20 to 0.30 yuan ($0.03 to $0.05),” he said.

State-owned newspaper Liaoning Daily reported that authorities had been implementing rolling blackouts for companies since mid-September to ease the burden on the regional power grid. However, shortages had become so “severe” that supplies to both residential and commercial power were cut to “prevent the collapse of the entire power grid.” [Source]

In addition to disruptions to business and manufacturing, ordinary citizens were also inconvenienced by the power cuts. The BBC reported on how the unannounced power cuts put people’s health and safety at risk:

In Liaoning province, a factory where ventilators suddenly stopped working had to send 23 staff to hospital with carbon monoxide poisoning.

There were also reports of some who were taken to hospital after they used stoves in poorly-ventilated rooms for heating, and people living in high-rise buildings who had to climb up and down dozens of flights of stairs as their lifts were not functioning.

One video circulating on Chinese media showed cars traveling on one side of a busy highway in Shenyang in complete darkness, as traffic lights and streetlights were switched off. City authorities told The Beijing News outlet that they were seeing a “massive” shortage of power.

Social media posts from the affected region said the situation was similar to living in neighboring North Korea. [Source]

Stricter environmental regulations, particularly regarding coal, are a major factor in the reduced energy supply. Coal accounts for about 57 percent of China’s energy use and is responsible for about 80 percent of its overall CO2 emissions. China is responsible for 27 percent of the world’s total CO2 emissions, more than all developing nations combined. This means that China’s overall energy use is at the heart of global climate issues. 

Cognizant of this burden, the Chinese government has taken measures to reduce the country’s coal usage. Earlier this year, the Central Environmental Inspection Team hurled unprecedented criticism at China’s domestic coal policy. In mid-September, the National Development and Reform Commission vowed to crack down on local officials who did not limit energy use, after twenty of thirty provinces and regions failed to meet energy consumption targets. Last week, President Xi Jinping announced China would stop producing coal-fired power projects abroad. The recent power cuts adhere to the spirit of these measures, and they may be linked to upcoming events such as the COP15 biodiversity summit in Kunming, the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow, and the Beijing Winter Olympics, when China’s environmental record will be in the global spotlight. 

On the other hand, some analysts argue that environmental and supply-side factors are not as important as purely economic factors, highlighting the continuing bureaucratic battle over environmental and economic policy planning priorities: 

The reasons for the power shortages also vary widely between different regions and provinces:

The energy crisis is also related to China’s role in international markets. Keith Bradsher from the New York Times explained how jump-starting the global economy strained energy supply in China’s export industries:

More regions of the world are reopening after pandemic-induced lockdowns, greatly increasing demand for China’s electricity-hungry export factories.

Export demand for aluminum, one of the most energy-intensive products, has been strong. Demand has also been robust for steel and cement, central to China’s vast construction programs.

[…] China’s economic rebound from the coronavirus has been driven in large part by heavy investment in infrastructure as well as the rise in exports. Overall industrial use consumes 70 percent of the electricity in China, led by the mostly state-owned producers of steel, cement and aluminum.

“If those guys produce more, it has a huge impact on electricity demand,” Professor Lin said, adding that China’s economic minders would order those three industrial users to ease back. [Source]

Given the production bottlenecks in China, international supply chains for electronics face major disruptions, as reported by Stella Yifan Xie, Yang Jie, and Stephanie Yang in the Wall Street Journal:

In one of the most affected areas, Kunshan, a city in China’s eastern Jiangsu province near Shanghai, more than 10 Taiwan-based semiconductor-related companies filed announcements with the Taiwan Stock Exchange this week saying they are temporarily closing local facilities until the end of September.

Several Apple suppliers are affected, such as mechanical-parts maker Eson Precision Engineering Co. and Unimicron Technology Corp., a printed-circuit-board maker.

[…] Eric Tseng, chief executive of research firm Isaiah Research, said semiconductor companies might avoid more significant power cuts, given China’s support of the industry. Meanwhile, manufacturers of other electronic components that go into laptops or consumer devices, which run with high power consumption, could face stricter measures, he said. [Source]

Orange Wang at the South China Morning Post described how the energy crisis has diminished China’s economic growth forecasts:

In light of the dire situation, Lu [Lu Ting, chief economist at Nomura] and his team have slashed their China GDP growth forecast from 8.2 per cent to 7.7 per cent, but even that may be too optimistic.

[…] Alongside Nomura’s Lu, who also warned that the conditions would likely result in a shortage of goods for the Thanksgiving and Christmas shopping seasons, Morgan Stanley now expects China’s GDP growth in the fourth quarter to drop by another percentage point if the conditions persist.

Peng Wensheng, chief economist at investment bank China International Capital Corporation, wrote in a note on Sunday that he expected the decline in production to drag down the national economic growth rate by 0.1 to 0.15 percentage points in both this quarter and next quarter. Peng also expects the wide-reaching impacts from the dramatic cuts in energy consumption to last until the end of the year. [Source]

The Global Times was unusually candid in reporting on the power cuts in Northeast China, noting the “collapse of the local power grid,” without any announced date for its restoration. By contrast, when Texas suffered a powerful snowstorm in February that knocked out much of its power grid, the Global Times leaped at the opportunity to publish a series of articles criticizing the U.S. response and touting China’s resilience to such widespread power outages. Hu Xijin, the editor-in-chief of the Global Times, was also highly critical of Tsai Ing-wen’s governance after rolling blackouts hit Taipei and other cities after an accident at a Taiwanese power plant in May. 

This hypocrisy, coupled with the tremendous inconveniences the power shortages have imposed on Chinese citizens, has inspired an outpouring of criticism, mockery, memes and personal stories on social media. CDT Chinese has collected some of these netizen comments, a selection of which are translated here:

人生何处不神抽：Hu [Xijin], you sure didn’t talk the same way in that Weibo post you wrote about Taiwan’s power outage back in May.  // len_babii: Please delete the memory of that gaffe.

坏球老胡：Historical Weibo has no practical significance. Please don’t use it for comparison.

你们啊太年轻sometimesnaive：Hu: “The power outage in Taiwan was due to Tsai Ing-wen’s incompetence, and but the power outage in Northeast China means our nation is playing the long game—and winning!”

walle2015: Didn’t you say we were playing the long game, and that after a few more months of power outages, the U.S. won’t be able to carry on with currency inflation? 

notmyChris：I just overheard a conversation between my parents: Mom: “The economy’s not looking so good.” Dad: “How’s it not looking good?” Mom: “These power outages.” Dad: “That just goes to show the economy’s doing great – all those factories using electricity.” Mom: “Then why are you off work six days a week?” Dad: “The power’s out!” I just can’t…

China_VideoNews：Ultraman was banned, resulting in a flood of monsters in the Northeast who went on a rampage destroying power generating facilities, which resulted in power outages—the logic is clear! [Chinese]

Translation by Cindy Carter



source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2021/09/netizen-voices-coal-costs-climate-commitments-and-competing-priorities-inform-chinas-latest-power-outages/
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Saturday, 25 September 2021

Photo: DSCF6037, by Hsiuan Boyen



source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2021/09/photo-dscf6037-by-hsiuan-boyen/
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Friday, 24 September 2021

China Bans Cryptocurrency Transactions and Mining

On Friday, Chinese regulators announced a nationwide ban on cryptocurrency transactions and cryptocurrency mining. The culmination of a years-long crackdown, the move was meant to close loopholes in previous attempts to regulate cryptocurrency, root out rivals to government-issued money, and reduce the energy consumption of the heavily polluting sector. It also comes amid Xi Jinping’s long-running anti-corruption campaign and more recent efforts to reign in powerful tech-sector businesses and monopolistic platforms.

Stock prices for Bitcoin and other popular cryptocurrencies nose-dived before recovering slightly. Analysts remained largely optimistic about the future vitality of cryptocurrency in the broader global economy, but in China, the ban paves the way for greater state control over financial transactions and for the rollout of China’s own state-backed digital currency. 

The news was announced by the People’s Bank of China (PBOC), in coordination with the Cyberspace Administration of China, the People’s Supreme Court, and eight other government bodies. Elaine Yu and Joe Wallace from the Wall Street Journal reported on PBOC’s notice: 

Naming bitcoin, ether and tether as examples, the central bank said cryptocurrencies are issued by non-monetary authorities, use encryption technologies and exist in digital form, and shouldn’t be circulated and used in the market as currencies.

It also said it is illegal for overseas exchanges to provide services for residents in China through the internet.

[…] The statement called for a comprehensive monitoring system, giving local governments “full play” to monitor their regions and flag early warnings. It vowed to crack down on “illegal financial activities” related to cryptocurrencies, and investigate employees of foreign cryptocurrency exchanges inside China as well as others in the industry who continued to advertise or provide crypto-related services.

[…] Chinese regulators have worried that cryptocurrencies’ decentralized, anonymous transactions facilitate money laundering and illegal capital flight out of the country. There are signs that its resolve to crack down on cryptocurrencies has grown stronger in recent months. [Source]

The ban follows a series of tough measures by the Chinese government to crack down on cryptocurrencies, dating back 2013, when the government prohibited Chinese banks from using Bitcoin. Matthew Fox of Business Insider assembled a broad timeline of recent regulations:

December 2013: China bans banks from handling bitcoin transactions […]

September 2017: China orders local cryptocurrency exchanges to cease operations.

The country banned initial coin offerings and ordered all domestic cryptocurrency exchanges to end operations within the country. The move came amid a strong bull market for bitcoin which eventually topped out near $20,000 in late 2017.

May 2021: China bans various financial institutions and payment firms from offering crypto services.

The country reiterated its prior bans from 2013 and 2017, citing the dangers of speculative trading in the crypto coins, and cemented the ban for various payment platforms and business activities related to cryptocurrencies.

June 2021: China ramps up crypto mining crackdown.

The country set its eyes on banning cryptocurrency mining with various regulations towards the sector. Following the new rules, bitcoin mining immediately moved overseas to more crypto friendly countries, including the US. China cited environmental concerns and excessive energy consumption as reasons for its new restrictions. [Source]

One motivation for the Chinese government’s harsh stance on cryptocurrencies relates to their enormous energy demands and negative environmental impact. Bitcoin’s annual global electricity demand is greater than that of the entire country of Finland. According to researchers at Cambridge University, China’s share of global hashrate, the computing power needed to run Bitcoin mining operations, declined from a lion’s-share of 75 percent in 2019 to a still-impressive 43 percent in April 2021. Maintaining this level of energy consumption is unsustainable, relying on cheap, coal-powered electricity grids in provinces like Sichuan and Xinjiang, which is in direct conflict with President Xi Jinping’s long-term commitments to address climate change. 

Another explanation for China’s crypto ban is that the government is clearing space for its own state-backed digital currency. In April 2020, the People’s Bank of China created and tested China’s new cyber yuan (e-CNY, or DCNY) in several pilot programs across different cities. The new digital currency could have far-reaching financial stability and geopolitical consequences, such as eliminating illicit financial flows and undermining the efficacy of future U.S. sanctions. It also allows the government to reinforce its surveillance state by enhancing the ability to track all individual transactions of the currency in real time. Barclay Bram from Wired described how China’s state-backed digital currency fits into the CCP’s data-driven future: 

“In general, this does strengthen authoritarianism. Putting the levers of financial power in the government’s hands does increase CCP power,” says [Center for a New American Security Adjunct Senior Fellow Yaya] Fanusie. However, as he notes, the picture is more nuanced and complex. “This is part of a bigger process. It’s less about what the Digital Yuan will do, but more about what happens when China becomes more data driven, and when the government has significantly more centralised data in general.” Seen in this light, the DCNY is part of a much bigger plan the government has long been pursuing to get a more detailed picture of its population through big data. As an article from MIT Technology Review argued, who needs democracy when you have data? The CCP is trying to leverage the massive amounts of data generated by an increasingly digitised society to try to create more responsive government systems. [Source]

The announcement of China’s cryptocurrency ban rattled the markets. Jonathan Ponciano at Forbes tallied the initial shock: 

The value of the world’s cryptocurrencies tanked to a low of about $1.8 trillion by 7:15 a.m. EDT on Friday, falling roughly 9% and losing $188 billion in market value within just three hours of China’s announcement, according to crypto-data website CoinMarketCap.

The stark plunge wiped out virtually all of the gains since a global stock selloff on Monday triggered the crypto market’s worst decline in weeks, with top cryptocurrencies bitcoin, ether and Solana’s sol falling between 6% and 10% apiece Friday morning. [Source]

However, as stocks recovered somewhat, analysts emerged divided in their interpretations of the longer-term impact. Some viewed China’s new ban as an inevitability, and retained their faith in the future of the cryptocurrency market, which enjoys great popularity in the U.S., Kazakhstan, El Savlador and many other countries. FTX, the second most popular crypto trading platform, went so far as to move its headquarters from Hong Kong to the Bahamas upon hearing the news. But despite China’s ban on cryptocurrencies, their underlying blockchain technology is still feasible and popular in China, leaving plenty of opportunities in nascent markets. Vildana Hajric and Katherine Greifeld from Bloomberg reported on the mixed views over how the ban fits into the future of cryptocurrency in China and world:

Chen Arad, chief operating officer at crypto risk surveillance firm Solidus Labs: 

“Though China’s move is particularly dramatic, it reflects on similar concerns regulators globally are sharing surrounding crypto market integrity and its role in illicit activity. Manipulation and fraud is not unique to crypto but, as a new asset class, digital assets present new challenges and have more to prove to regulators and the public.”

[…] Steven McClurg, chief investment officer at crypto fund-manager Valkyrie Investments: 

“China has banned crypto at least a dozen times this year. The volatility we are seeing today may be a knee-jerk reaction by some, but most market participants have already priced a China ban in from the beginning of the summer.”

[…] Alex Tapscott, managing director of the digital asset group at Ninepoint Partners:

“Veteran traders are conditioned to shrug off bad news from China and buy the dip, but could this time be different? There are a few reasons to think so,” including China’s tech crackdown, as well as its pursuit of its digital yuan, among other factors. [Source]



source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2021/09/china-bans-cryptocurrency-transactions-and-mining/
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#MeToo Activist Huang Xueqin and Labor Activist Wang Jianbing Are Missing, Feared Detained

Friends of two Guangzhou-based activists who have been incommunicado since Sunday fear that they have been detained and may be facing prosecution. Prominent #MeToo activist Huang Xueqin (Sophia Huang) had been planning to leave Guangzhou for Shenzhen on July 19, and fly from Hong Kong to London the following day. She was due to begin a Master’s program at the University of Sussex as a recipient of the Chevening Scholarship. Her friend Wang Jianbing, a longtime advocate for workers with occupational diseases, was planning to see her off.

As days passed without news of the two activists, Huang Xueqin’s university and future host country weighed in on her disappearance. The International Federation of Journalists site quoted a spokesperson from the University of Sussex: “‘We are concerned about the safety and whereabouts of our student,’ he said. ‘Our staff are liaising with Chevening to seek further details.'” On Friday, The Telegraph reported that the U.K. Foreign Office had become involved, as well: “’We are urgently looking into reports that friends of Huang Xueqin lost contact with her on 19 September,’ a Foreign Office spokesperson said.”

Guo Rui, reporting for the South China Morning Post, detailed concerns about the welfare of the two activists:

[Friend Robert Cheng] said he was concerned that like other activists Huang and Wang could be accused of inciting subversion.

“Under the [subversion] charge, they may face heavy punishment and torture,” Cheng said.

“Huang Xueqin only wanted to go to Sussex to study and was told by the authorities last month that they would not stop her [leaving China]. She had her passport and visa.

“So she had actually kept a low profile for months hoping she could make the trip.” [Source]

Chinese Human Rights Defenders described the possible charges against the two, and how their disappearance appears to be part of a larger ongoing crackdown on civil society groups:

At least one mutual friend of the two was summoned by police the same day of their disappearance. This friend was reportedly questioned by authorities about peaceful, private gatherings with friends at Wang Jianbing’s residence. 

Friends of Ms. Huang and Mr. Wang fear that they have been detained by the public security of Zhuhai District in Guangzhou and that Mr. Wang may face a charge of “inciting subversion of state authority” for hosting gatherings at his home. Chinese authorities have frequently used this state security crime against members of civil society, including for peaceful gatherings at private residences.

“Chinese officials are likely launching another round of crackdowns on civil society ahead of next year’s Beijing Winter Olympics. Authorities have been going after any attempt to form associations, assemble peacefully, or to build communities of mutual support, apparently seeing them as ‘threats’ to national security,” said CHRD senior researcher Ramona Li. [Source]

A journalist who once worked for popular publications such as Southern Metropolis Weekly and Xinkuaibao, Huang Xueqin began fighting for women’s rights in 2017 after going public about her own experiences with sexual harassment in the workplace. Since then, she has been a tireless advocate for the rights of women, civil society groups, and ordinary citizens. This is not the first time she has been detained by Chinese authorities: in October 2019, she was arrested on charges of “picking quarrels and provoking trouble,” which could have resulted in a five-year prison sentence, after publishing an online essay about the protests in Hong Kong. She was held for three months in residential surveillance at a designated location (RSDL), and released in January 2020. Although she resumed her advocacy work, she was subject to continuing surveillance and restrictions, as Rights Corridor noted: 

Huang was present at a million-strong protest in Hong Kong on June 9, 2019 against plans to allow extradition to mainland China, and was detained for “picking quarrels and stirring up trouble” in October 2019, before being released on bail in January 2020, a status that often involves ongoing surveillance and restrictions on a person’s activities.

Her travel documents were also confiscated after her return, preventing her from beginning a law degree in Hong Kong the fall of 2019.

Huang had previously assisted in the investigation and reporting of a number of high-profile sexual harassment allegations against professors at Peking University, Wuhan University of Technology, Henan University and Sun Yat-sen University in Guangzhou. [Source]

Her friend and fellow activist Wang Jianbing has made significant contributions to the health and welfare of Chinese workers. RFA provided some background on his advocacy work:

Wang started to work in rural development after graduating in 2005, before joining the Guangzhou Gongmin NGO in 2014 [as] director and coordinator for youth work.

In 2018, he started advocacy and legal support work on behalf of workers with occupational diseases, and was a vocal supporter of China’s #MeToo movement. [Source]

Huang Xueqin is also a prolific writer whose essays appear in Matters and other publications. CDT has translated one of her essays in full: “To Resist Tyranny, Start Small”:

Tyrannical regimes wish to erase the line that divides public and private life. Their intent is to establish mutual misunderstanding, to make each other feel alienated, isolated, or antagonistic. In times like these, we need to make more eye contact with our friends, grow our empathy for others, make time for chitchat, and offer each other support and encouragement. Give the people in the midst of the action some warmth and energy so that they can press on.

[…] When the despot arrives and powers collude, they may use all their might to “maintain stability,” they may censor everything. Besides staying vigilant and resisting as much as we can, we must improve our health and strengthen our resolve. It could be that whoever outlives the other, wins. [Source]

In another essay from Matters, Huang Xueqin details her experience marching in protest against activists being kidnapped in Hong Kong and forcibly transported to mainland China. She ends on a rousing note, urging people not to remain passive or apathetic in the face of repression: 

Under the powerful machinery of the party-state, ignorance and fear can be cultivated, information and news can be blocked, truth and reality can be distorted. But once you have personally experienced it, once you have witnessed it for yourself, you cannot feign ignorance, nor give up recording it, nor sit and wait for death. The darkness is boundless, and but a trace of truth and light remains: this trace must not be surrendered. [Chinese]

Huang Xueqin’s bravery stands out during a time when all activists, even those advocating for basic protections and dignity for women, have to tread carefully. Fellow #MeToo activist Xianzi detailed this culture of fear in another powerful essay, published in the journal Made in China:

In my experience, to avoid certain accusations—that we are being manipulated by ‘foreign forces’ or engaging in ‘premeditated #MeToo accusations’—and the risks that come with them, feminists must emphasise that all they are doing is providing support. They should also avoid having too much social media contact with the person involved. We often receive written submissions from victims of sexual assault, but we encourage them to register for an online ID themselves and to post their own appeals, after which we can repost and spread the word. At the same time, if we establish private contacts with a party involved in a sexual assault case and provide legal and voluntary assistance, it is necessary to keep this confidential, even to the point that we only communicate via Signal or other secure platforms. In short, we cannot give the impression that feminists, and especially activists, are personally connected to the victims of sexual assault. [Source]



source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2021/09/metoo-activist-huang-xueqin-and-labor-activist-wang-jianbing-are-missing-feared-detained/
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Thursday, 23 September 2021

Hong Kong’s Expansive National Security Law Swallows Activists, Bail Requests, and M&Ms

Hong Kong authorities’ implementation of the National Security Law has been expanding in scope and strictness, with broader language used to describe alleged violations and harsh interpretations of individual cases. As civil society crumbles under its weight, the law is increasingly revealing itself to be a tool for crushing dissent rather than protecting security. Iain Marlow at Bloomberg traced the quiet evolution of the language used in National Security Law cases: 

City authorities have begun using the phrase “contrary to the interests of national security” in recent weeks to define new red lines in the entertainment industry and the tax code. Previously, officials had warned more specifically against anything that might “endanger national security.” The latter term appears 31 times in the full text of the security law, while the “contrary to” phrasing is absent.

[…] “This shift in rhetoric suggests a move to embrace an even broader formulation of national security, and of national security crimes,” said Tom Kellogg, the executive director at Georgetown University’s Center for Asian Law. “We’ve seen a strong push to inject national security concepts into so many areas of Hong Kong life. It only makes sense that the government would use new rhetoric to deal with that broadening approach.” 

[…] The ambiguity of the newer phrasing gives Lam and other officials the ability to “arbitrarily” expand the definition of potential violations, said Jerome Cohen, founder of the U.S.-Asia Law Institute at the New York University School of Law and one of America’s foremost experts on Chinese law.

“I would not underestimate the importance of ‘guidance’ in determining the meaning to be legally attached to ambiguous terms,” he said, noting that courts and legislators often defer to administrators’ interpretations of vague statutory terms. [Source]

The new language is already taking root in official guidelines. The Hong Kong government introduced a Film Censorship Bill in late August containing three amendments that use the new phrase “contrary to the interests of national security.” In early September, the government updated tax guidelines for charities, stating that any charitable organization supporting or promoting activities “contrary to the interests of national security” will be punished. 

Prosecutions under the National Security Law have continued. This week, Hong Kong national security officers arrested four members of a student activist group, Student Politicism, and charged them with conspiracy to incite subversion of state power. If convicted, they could face seven years in jail. The students, aged 18 to 20, were alleged to have dissuaded people from using the government Covid-19 tracking app and to have provided supplies for people in prison. Candice Chau from the South China Morning Post described how the government interpreted this latter activity as a threat: 

Police also searched the group’s storage space at a warehouse in Kwai Chung and confiscated items including dried fish snacks, M&M candies, bottles of body lotion, towels, postcards and flags.

Li accused the group of “systematically providing resources to like-minded people who are jailed,” and cited the Secretary for Security and the head of the correctional services as saying that those resources were useful in “recruiting followers in prisons.”

[…] Smuggling such items inside to recruit followers and build influence would “create hatred towards the government and endanger national security,” Tang said. [Source]

Hong Kong authorities have also been unusually strict in determining whether defendants should receive bail while awaiting prosecution. All four students arrested in the Student Politicism case were denied bail on Tuesday, after the magistrate sided with prosecutors in a hearing overseen by jurists hand-picked by Chief Executive Carrie Lam. The day before, a justice of the High Court denied bail to another opposition activist, Roy Tam Hoi-pong, who was tried for subversion after taking part in an unofficial primary election last year. In total, 47 opposition activists and politicians connected to this case have been arrested for conspiracy to commit subversion; most of them have been held in custody for over six months, and only 14 have been granted bail. The Principal Magistrate continues to extend their time in custody, stating that more time is needed for pre-trial legal proceedings, on which the media has been prohibited from reporting.

For those entangled in the web of national security prosecution, bail may no longer be a common legal endowment. Stand News described “society’s new normal” of endless proceedings and ordinary citizens targeted: 

The provisions of the Hong Kong National Security Law stipulate that bail will not be granted unless the appointed judge “has sufficient reason to believe that the defendant will not continue to commit acts endangering national security.” The people of Hong Kong have discovered that being “remanded in custody pending trial” is society’s new normal; after the freezing of Apple Daily’s accounts and the successive arrests of several of the publication’s high-ranking executives, everyone discovered that even a major media organization could be reduced to bankruptcy in a single week.

[…] When the National Security Law (NSL) first emerged, Hong Kong officials repeatedly emphasized that NSL was only aimed at “a small group of people.” One year later, the list of individuals arrested under the NSL includes politicians, media tycoons, journalists, the hosts of online shows, and even many ordinary citizens.

According to law enforcement data, as of the twenty-first of this month, a total of 153 people aged between 15 and 79 have been arrested for engaging in acts and activities that endanger national security. There are four crimes that fall under the National Security Law: secession, subversion of state power, terrorist activity, and collusion with foreign countries or foreign forces to endanger national security. There have been formal prosecutions of all of these crimes; if the defendants are found guilty, they face the maximum sentence of life imprisonment. [Chinese]

At Vice this week, Holmes Chan reported that one anonymous judge had privately expressed concern over the National Security Law’s distortion of legal norms, condemning the sentencing of Tong Ying-kit, the first person charged under it, who was convicted of secession and terrorism for driving his motorbike into police while holding a protest flag. 

“Privately, I felt this case was unfair. This is not how the law should work,” the judge said during an exclusive interview.

[…] The judge, who spoke to VICE World News anonymously due to the sensitivity of the matter, said that the court relied on a “questionable” understanding of criminal law concepts and sentenced Tong too harshly. That assessment was based on the judge’s prior experience, though they had no involvement in Tong’s trial.

“[Tong] didn’t do much of anything—he didn’t commit murder or arson,” the judge said wryly. “He is the most benevolent terrorist in the world.” [Source]

Translation by Cindy Carter.



source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2021/09/hong-kongs-expansive-national-security-law-swallows-activists-bail-requests-and-mms/
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