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UK should give British nationality to Hong Kong citizens, Tugendhat says

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UK should give British nationality to Hong Kong citizens, Tugendhat says

Move would be to reassure Hong Kong’s people rather than facing down Chinese threats, he says

The UK should give Hong Kong citizens full UK nationality as a means of reassurance amid the current standoff with Beijing, the chair of the influential Commons foreign affairs committee has argued.

Tom Tugendhat said this should have happened to people in the formerly British-ruled territory in 1997, when it was handed back to Chinese control, and that doing so now would reassure Hong Kong’s people that they were supported by the UK.

Hong Kong has been gripped by 10 weeks of large-scale and occasionally violent pro-democracy demonstrations, which have been met by a sometimes brutal police response, and increasingly trenchant threats from Beijing.

On Monday, two Chinese state media outlets ran video footage showing armoured personnel and troop carriers purportedly driving to Shenzhen, which borders Hong Kong, prompting concerns about military intervention.

Under the so-called “one country, two systems” arrangement that had Hong Kong returned to Chinese rule, Beijing considers the population to be Chinese nationals. However, a number of people in the territory hold what is known as a British national (overseas) passport, which gives some rights, for example to stay in the UK for up to six months, but no automatic ability to live permanently or work.

Tugendhat said: “The UK had obligations to Hong Kong citizens before 1997, and the extension of overseas citizenship, which is in many ways a second-tier citizenship, was a mistake, and I think it’s one that should be corrected. At a time when there are clearly tensions in Hong Kong, the UK could reassure many Hong Kong citizens that their existing rights are recognised by the UK, and they are valued.”

 

GO RED CHINA! GO RED CHINA! GO DAZIS! GO DAZIS!

 

 

 

 

RED China Exposed: Time for the West to put human rights ahead of trade

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Beijing is prepping for a massacre in Hong Kong: time for the West to put human rights ahead of free trade

 

After eight weeks of huge Hong Kong street protests against Beijing’s rule, the People’s Republic is massing police and soldiers just across the border. Message: If the protesters don’t quit, a bloodbath is coming.

Beijing has also started denouncing the protests as the work of American provocateurs. That’s so the regime can paint its Tiananmen Square-style crackdown as a battle against “foreign influence,” not a smashing of Chinese people who decided all on their own that they’d rather be free.

A quarter-century ago, the West wagered that welcoming China into the world economy would seduce the Communist Party into allowing ever-more freedom. That bet’s been lost.

There’s precious little ideology to China’s “communism” anymore and no hint of seeking economic justice. But the party will allow no challenge to its rule. Since Xi Jinping took over as president in 2013, he’s rolled back freedom after freedom.

Christian churches are smashed and worshippers jailed; Xi has even bullied Rome into letting him choose Catholic bishops in China. Re-education camps house 1 million Uighers in a province teeming with hi-tech surveillance. Twelve million other Muslims suffer stepped-up repression and systematic abuses, notes Human Rights Watch. Buddhists deemed members of the Falun Gong movement pack prisons that provide involuntary “organ donors.”

And Hong Kong’s promised “high degree of autonomy” has become a joke. The mainland has even begun to databank its residents’ biometrics (DNA, fingerprints, voice samples, etc.), the obvious basis for eventual Big Brother surveillance.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said recently that “protest is appropriate” and “we hope the Chinese will do the right thing,” but Team Trump overall has muted criticism as trade talks continue.

Hard as it might hit the stock market, maybe human rights should become the issue in those negotiations: In the long run, America doesn’t win by trading freely with a nation run by monsters.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yMmHksSxpHQ

 

 

 

GO RED CHINA! GO RED CHINA!