Day: March 29, 2024

Hong Kong lawmaker Paul Tse, who was among dozens of pro-government legislators who voted in favor of the city’s Safeguarding National Security Ordinance last week, has removed posts from his Facebook page for fear that comments he had posted there earlier could be used to prosecute him under the law.

Tse’s Facebook account was unavailable when checked by RFA Cantonese on March 27.

The move came after Tse, who represents the tourism sector in Hong Kong’s Legislative Council, was criticized by Chief Executive John Lee in January for sounding like an opposition politician after he accused the city’s government of caring more about the opinions of social media users in mainland China than those of Hong Kong’s tax paying citizens.

Tse’s move underscores fears among Hong Kongers that the new law, which critics say will undermine human rights protections, will mean ever-widening definitions of what constitutes a crime, and leave people vulnerable to malicious reporting to the authorities.

Lee warned that Tse’s criticism of the government’s law enforcement tactics was “dangerous,” and reminded him of rhetoric from the 2019 protests, as well as “soft confrontation,” the government’s term for subtler forms of opposition and criticism that it also regards as potentially criminal.

“Soft confrontation” was one of the terms used by Lee and his officials as justification for a second national security law under Article 23 of Hong Kong’s Basic Law, which functions as a constitutional framework for the city’s government.

Social media criticism

Tse told a question and answer session in the legislature on Jan. 25 that the Hong Kong government seemed more responsive to social media criticism from the rest of China than to its own people.

“Law enforcement forces have seemingly given the public the impression that they value the online opinions of Xiaohongshu users, who are not taxpayers, more than Hong Kong citizens, who actually pay tax,” Tse said, referring to a social media and e-commerce platform described as “China’s answer to Instagram.”

He quipped that the attempt to placate mainland Chinese public opinion would lead to “Xiaohongshu running Hong Kong,” a play on the government’s insistence that only “patriots” loyal to Beijing should run Hong Kong.

Tse singled out heavy-handed police enforcement of jaywalking penalties and heavy fines on restaurants for creating obstructions, as well as “cracking down on bookstores.”

“Some Hong Kongers feel that the government’s style of governance is far removed from the reality of actual Hong Kongers who pay their taxes,” Tse said.

Repeated calls to Tse’s phone rang unanswered during office hours on Wednesday.

However, Tse wrote in a column in the Economic Journal newspaper that he had deleted his Facebook account due to fears that his past posts about Xiaohongshu running Hong Kong and other topics would be used to accuse him of “incitement to hatred,” possibly through a malicious tip-off via the much-used national security hotline.

Tse’s Facebook account was visible again by noon GMT on Friday, but all posts appeared to have been hidden or deleted.

‘No need to panic’

By contrast, fellow LegCo member Doreen Kong said she wasn’t worried about her recent comments criticizing the government for spending HK$50 million, or US$6.4 million, on an illuminated egg art installation in the Central business district.

“If you do not intend to endanger national security, you will not break the law,” Kong told the Hong Kong Economic Journal. “There is no need to panic.” 

The article also quoted lawmaker Lau Chi-pang as saying that he isn’t worried about keeping books banned under the national security crackdown for private use.

“I research riots, so it’s normal for me to have historic data about riots,” the paper quoted Lau as saying. “Any research into Hong Kong between 2010 and 2020 will inevitably involve inflammatory propaganda and publications from that era.”

Documentary films depicting the 2019 protest movement have been banned from public screening in Hong Kong, because they are deemed to “glorify” a protest movement that the government has said was an attempt by “hostile foreign forces” to overthrow the government.

Lau said a historian who privately read Guerilla Warfare by Cuban revolutionary Che Guevara but didn’t try to put its ideas into practice wouldn’t be committing “incitement” under the national security law.

RFA Cantonese reached out to fellow lawmaker Gary Zhang, who has also made some remarks that are critical of government policies, and to former pro-democracy lawmaker Tik Chi-yuen, regarded as the only token “opposition” member of LegCo, for comment on Wednesday, but neither responded.

The current Legislative Council was elected under new rules that only allow “patriots” approved by the government to run, and has no remaining opposition members, with many former pro-democracy lawmakers in exile or on trial under the 2020 National Security Law.

‘Seditious’ speech

Meanwhile, Albert Chen, chair professor of law at the University of Hong Kong, was at pains to reassure people that they were unlikely to run afoul of the Safeguarding National Security Ordinance unwittingly.

The law’s provisions regarding “seditious” speech were most worthy of the public’s attention, Chen said in comments reported in the Ming Pao newspaper on March 27, reminding readers that Hong Kong’s courts heard more than 30 cases of “sedition” in 2020 alone.

Citizens should “pay attention to relevant legal standards” in their speech, to avoid accidentally running afoul of the law, he told the paper.

But he said “constructive criticism” was unlikely to be judged to be “incitement of hatred or contempt of the government” under the new law, without detailing what criteria might be used to gauge if criticism was “constructive” or not.

Translated by Luisetta Mudie. Edited by Roseanne Gerin.

Myanmar junta leader Min Aung Hlaing told Russian media that promised nationwide elections may not be possible until peace and stability are restored. Myanmar’s military overthrew the civilian-led government in a February 2021 coup, citing unproven claims of voter fraud in an election the military-backed party lost badly.

The coup plunged the country of 55 million people into chaos, with citizens forming anti-junta militias and joining forces with ethnic armies in an alliance that has inflicted repeated military defeats on the junta army.

An ethnic army seized five military junta camps near the Myanmar-Chinese border, residents told Radio Free Asia on Friday.

During an offensive, the Kachin Independence Army, or KIA, captured encampments under junta Battalion 366 near Kachin state’s Momauk township. The seizure also gave the ethnic armed group partial control of a China-Myanmar border trade road after the Thursday offensive.

Since Myanmar’s February 2021 coup, fighting between the KIA and junta forces has raged for weeks at a time over the state’s lucrative jade mines and the rebel army’s historical stronghold near its headquarters on the Myanmar-China border.

The KIA now controls portions of two major trade roads in the state since its partial capture of the domestic Myitkyina-Bhamo highway in early March, in addition to a junta camp under Battalion 142 in Momauk township. A battle further north in Lai Zar caused shells to land in China, burning down several houses, residents said. 

One resident told RFA that the junta retaliated with air strikes after Yaw Yung Artillery and Hpaleng Hill camps were captured Thursday.

“Yaw Yung was entirely captured and Hpaleng camp was also captured yesterday,” he said, asking to remain anonymous for fear of reprisals. “The junta’s air force came to open fire while KIA troops were confiscating things in these camps after the captures.”

Yaw Yung is an important strategic camp because of the high-level commander stationed there and its proximity to trading posts with China, residents living near the captured camps said. 

Kachin army troops are currently stationed in Lwegel city, about 11 kilometers (seven miles) from Yaw Yung Artillery camp, residents said, adding that they are negotiating with junta troops and administration staff on their exit from the city.

RFA contacted Kachin state’s junta spokesperson Moe Min Thein and KIA spokesperson Col. Naw Bu on the junta’s surrender, but neither responded.

According to a KIA statement released on Thursday, five junta camps, including Shan Tai, Bang Yau, Law Mun, Hpaleng and Yaw Yung, have been captured since Wednesday.

The KIA and joint guerilla armies have captured over 40 junta camps in Momauk and Waingmaw townships near the KIA’s headquarters in Lai Zar city in Kachin state as of Thursday. 

Translated by RFA Burmese. Edited by Kiana Duncan and Mike Firn.

China’s troubled state-owned property giant Vanke Group says it will cut debt by 100 billion yuan (US$13.8 billion) in the next two years, as sales plunged and profit nearly halved in 2023 amid a deepening crisis in the sector.

But Zhu Jiusheng, Vanke’s chief executive officer, pointed out in an earnings press conference on Friday that the company’s fundamental capabilities, without giving specifics, have not changed, despite the short-term “challenges and pressure.”

The recent downgrade of its credit rating by global rating agency Moody’s to “junk”, in fact dealt “relatively limited impact,” he said, according to Chinese state-owned media reports. 

Conversely, Vanke’s long-term partnership with 26 banks has established “our allies in risk prevention.”

Still, with or without allies, Vanke reported a 11 percentage point increase to a net debt ratio of 55% last year. Furthermore, 73% of its assets are financed by creditors, albeit a 3.7 percentage point decline from 2022, making the company highly leveraged. A below 50% level is usually considered healthy. 

The State Council, or China’s cabinet, also asked 12 banks to provide a financing lifeline of as much as 80 billion yuan to Vanke two weeks ago. 

This bucked the broader policy to let insolvent developers take their own downward course, which has compounded a spiraling crisis in the sector, once a major economic growth driver.

Analysts attributed Beijing’s rare intervention to Vanke’s state-held background – its largest shareholder is the Shenzhen Metro Group. But the move is in line with Chinese President Xi Jinping’s policy of advancing state enterprises and a retreat of the private sector. 

Other distressed and privately-owned real estate firms Evergrande Group and Country Garden Holdings have been left to their own devices. 

The Hong Kong High Court issued a liquidation order in January for Evergrande, which has been drowned in more than US$300 billion in debt.  

A similar fate looms for Country Garden which received a liquidation petition from one of its creditors in Hong Kong. Its total liabilities are close to US$200 billion.

Country Garden said in a filing to the Hong Kong stock exchange on Thursday that it  missed the deadline to release its 2023 annual results. 

Hong Kong-listed companies are required to disclose their financial results three months after the end of the financial year and Thursday was the deadline, ahead of the Easter weekend holiday in  the city. Evergrande has not disclosed its results either.

Meanwhile, from Vanke’s view point, Zhu said bankers are concerned about three factors – where the capital was deployed in the past financial year, which projects to finance, and adequacy of cash flow.

“Once these three questions are answered, the financing channels and banks’ supportive attitude become affirmative and the strength of their support will be adequate,” he added.

According to Zhu, Vanke has secured 16.9 billion yuan in additional funding for 42 projects across 22 Chinese cities under Beijing’s “white list” of approved projects that financial institutions should back. 

Edited by Taejun Kang and Mike Firn.