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Macau’s Rotten Borough

From Wall Street Journal Asia:

When Hong Kong was returned to China in 1997, Beijing promised the territory that its “ultimate aim” would be to select Hong Kong’s chief executive through “universal suffrage.” Since then, the Hong Kong government has dragged its feet on pushing China to implement this promise. The territory’s residents need only to look to nearby Macau to see what could happen if this democratic stall continues.

Macau’s “election” for chief executive kicked off last month when Fernando Chui Sai-on, a former culture minister, announced his candidacy. The mainland’s official Xinhua News Agency reported in May that the Chinese central government approved Mr. Chui’s decision to resign as culture minister, clearing him to seek the chief executive position.
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- June 12, 2009 1:06 AM
Hong Kong Closes Primary Schools on Swine Flu Cluster

Theresa Tang and Kelvin Wong report for Bloomberg:

Hong Kong will suspend classes at all primary schools, kindergartens and childcare centers for 14 days starting tomorrow after a confirmed cluster of swine flu cases, Chief Executive Donald Tsang said.

[..]Tsang said that 12 pupils at a secondary school were confirmed to have contracted H1N1 influenza. Classes at that school have also been halted for at least 14 days. Hong Kong confirmed its first locally contracted case in a 55-year-old man yesterday. The Lovells LLP employee had gone to a cocktail party organized by the international law firm that was attended by someone with swine flu.

[...]Eleven of the new cases were classmates of a 16-year-old girl at the secondary school who tested positive for swine flu yesterday. Together with three more imported cases, they brought the number of human swine flu cases in the city to 63, according to a statement posted on the government’s Web site today.
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- June 11, 2009 10:26 AM
Two Charged over Plot to Murder Hong Kong Democrat

Two men have been charged for plotting to assassinate Martin Lee, one of Hong Kong’s leading advocates for democracy. From AFP:

The plot to kill Lee, a veteran activist and long-time critic of Beijing, was revealed on Saturday, but took place last summer during elections for Hong Kong’s legislature.

[...]The South China Morning Post revealed the story, saying police had arrested an alleged hitman from China and a Hong Kong accomplice.

[...A spokeswoman] said the 49-year-old had been charged with conspiracy to shoot a person, carrying a firearm with intent, possession of a firearm and ammunition without a licence and conspiracy to commit grievous bodily harm.

The 50-year-old has been charged with possessing arms and ammunition without a licence.

See the South China Morning Post article which broke the story (subscription required).
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- May 31, 2009 3:08 PM
Hong Kong Protest over Tiananmen

Several thousand protesters marched in Hong Kong today in anticipation of the 20th anniversary of the 1989 military crackdown on student demonstrators in Tiananmen Square. This BBC report also has video of interviews with protest participants:

Thousands have marched in Hong Kong to mark the forthcoming 20th anniversary of the Tiananmen killings, in one of the few such events on Chinese soil.

[...]Many at the protest wore black and white, to symbolise mourning.

Police said at least 4,700 people had gathered. Tens of thousands more are expected to attend a candlelit vigil on Thursday.

More details of demonstrator demands from Voice of America:

Protesters urged the government in Beijing to reverse its verdict condemning the Tiananmen protests as a counterrevolutionary riot.

They called for justice for the victims of the Chinese government’s crackdown on June 3rd and 4th in which hundreds and possibly thousands of students and workers were killed on the streets of the Chinese capital.

The Hong Kong demonstrators were joined by Tiananmen protest leader Xiong Yan, who lives in exile in the United States.

Xiong Yan’s presence in Hong Kong is a surprise. From IOL:

Xiong, who was put on a list of the authorities’ 21 “most-wanted” student protesters after the occupation of Tiananmen was broken up, spent two years in jail before being smuggled to the US via Hong Kong.

His entry was unexpected because of China’s sensitive attitude to any criticism of the crackdown.

“I was very surprised as I have tried many, many times to come,” said Xiong, who arrived Saturday night, the first time he had set foot on Chinese soil in 17 years.
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- May 31, 2009 2:50 PM
Zhao Memoir Goes on Sale

The Chinese edition of the memoirs of Zhao Ziyang (赵紫阳), former general secretary of the Chinese Communist Pary, went on sale in Hong Kong on Friday, May 29, exactly 20 years after he was forced from power for opposing the military crackdown on students in the 1989 protests. From Radio Free Asia:

The memoir of China’s late former leader Zhao Ziyang, who fell from power at the height of the student-led pro-democracy movement 20 years ago, went on sale Friday in Hong Kong, the only Chinese city where its publication wasn’t banned.

The book, titled in English Prisoner of the State: The Secret Journal of Zhao Ziyang, was compiled from audio recordings made by Zhao, a former general secretary of China’s Communist Party who died under house arrest at his Beijing home in 2005.

[...]The son of a former top Zhao aide meanwhile told a symposium on the Zhao memoirs in Hong Kong that he hoped the release of the book, which he help to produce, would put pressure on the Chinese government to revise its view of the Tiananmen protests of two decades agao, in which hundreds were killed.

Read more about Zhao Ziyang’s memoirs on CDT here, here, here, and here.
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- May 30, 2009 12:42 PM
China Plans Shenzhen Reforms, Eyes HK-centred Hub

From Reuters:

China has mapped out a plan to link its southern boom-town of Shenzhen with Hong Kong to build a global centre for transport, distribution, trade and innovation, as it seeks a greater role in the global economic arena over the next decade.

Shenzhen, China’s first special economic zone built in the early 1980s to take the lead in free-market reforms, will be prised open further and put at the forefront of China’s financial reforms, including the launch of a Nasdaq-style board for start-up firms, official newspapers said on Wednesday, quoting a document of the State Council, China’s cabinet.
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- May 27, 2009 1:51 AM
The Subtle Power of Zao Wou-Ki

The New York Times profiles artist Zao Wou-ki (Zhao Wuji 赵无极), in advance of two events in Hong Kong highlighting his work, an auction at Christie’s and an exhibit at Alisan Fine Arts:

Even as the bubble in prices for mainland art made in the last 20 years burst along with the global financial markets, Zao’s works have continued to be in high demand among collectors. During last winter’s auction season for Chinese art, a Zao painting sold in Hong Kong for 45.5 million Hong Kong dollars, or $5.89 million, a record for the artist.

“Zao is part of a coterie of Chinese artists that came of aesthetic age in the 1950s, an intriguing period of time that saw a wide range of Chinese artists practicing in the most diverse circumstance imaginable,” said Joan Kee, a University of Michigan art historian who is a specialist on postwar and contemporary Asian painting. “On the one hand there was Zao, living in Paris and represented by important New York galleries like Samuel Kootz,” she said. “Then you had artists like Lin Fengmian, working under the Communist regime on the eve of the anti-rightist campaign.”

Zao moved to France a year before Mao Zedong took control of China, and by the 1950s the painter’s career was thriving thanks to a following among European and American collectors. He was acquainted with Paul Klee, whose style influenced Zao’s 1952 work “Les poires vertes” (Green Pears), which will be auctioned at Christie’s on Monday. Pierre Matisse was his dealer at one point.

“Zao was one of the few Chinese artists to reach a level of commercial success that anticipated the present market for contemporary Chinese art,” Dr. Kee said. “He was very good at framing his paintings in terms that audiences of the time could understand. Recall that this is the 1950s, when Asian philosophy and aesthetics drew substantial interest from artists like Henri Michaux, Mark Tobey, and Yves Klein.”

Read more about Zao and see images of his art work.
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- May 21, 2009 9:36 PM
A Satire That Caused an Uproar in Both China and The Philippines

Hong Kong columnist Chip Tsao (陶杰 Tao Jie) wrote a satirical article recently commenting on the dispute over the Spratly Islands between China and the Philippines. Very few Chinese or Filipinos got his humor. Instead, so many Filipinos were infuriated by the “racism” displayed in the article that Manila barred Tsao’s entry. While Tsao received very different reactions from Chinese readers, his message was also misinterpreted. Tsao was trying to ridicule fanatic patriotism in the article. But tens of thousands Chinese thought he was defending China’s territory and are lauding him as a patriotic hero.

Tsao is a seasoned newsman and a well-known columnist in Hong Kong. He got his college education in Britain, worked for BBC for some years, and now writes articles for Apple Daily and Hong Kong Magazine regularly.

The article at issue, A War at Home, was published in Hong Kong Magazine on March 27, in which Tsao wrote about the Spratly Islands dispute from the perspective of fervent patriots among his countrymen.

The Russians sank a Hong Kong freighter last month, killing the seven Chinese seamen onboard. We can live with that-—Lenin and Stalin were once the ideological mentors of all Chinese people. The Japanese planted a flag on Diàoyú Island. That’s no big problem-—we Hong Kong Chinese love Japanese cartoons, Hello Kitty, and shopping in Shinjuku, let alone our round-the-clock obsession with karaoke.

But hold on—even the Filipinos? Manila has just claimed sovereignty over the scattered rocks in the South China Sea called the Spratly Islands, complete with a blatant threat from its congress to send gunboats to the South China Sea to defend the islands from China if necessary. This is beyond reproach. The reason: There are more than 130,000 Filipina maids working as HK$3,580-a-month cheap labor in Hong Kong. As a nation of servants, you don’t flex your muscles at your master, from whom you earn most of your bread and butter.

As a patriotic Chinese man, the news has made my blood boil. I summoned Louisa, my domestic assistant who holds a degree in international politics from the University of Manila, hung a map on the wall, and gave her a harsh lecture. I sternly warned her that if she wants her wages increased next year, she had better tell everyone of her compatriots in Statue Square on Sunday that the entirety of the Spratly Islands belongs to China…

The phrase “a nation of servants” together with other “racist” remarks — if they are taken literally — offended Filipino workers in Hong Kong and back home. They staged a protest, and the Bureau of Immigration in Manila barred Tsao from entering the Philippines. Tsao’s publisher, Hong Kong Magazine, has pulled the article off its website and replaced it with an apology.

The story appeared in headlines on dozens of major news websites in Mainland China shortly afterward, getting a sea of responses from readers.

The Chinese reporter who wrote the story didn’t bother to contact Tsao for comment, and he probably didn’t read Tsao’s original article. Instead, Fang Xiao at Dongfang Daily described the incident as follows:

…Tsao said in the article that as a patriot, he could not stand the Filipino government’s claim of sovereignty over Spratly Islands, because there are more than 130,000 Filipino domestic workers in Hong Kong. He wrote, “as a nation of servants, you don’t flex your muscles at your master.”

The Dongfang Daily story was posted Monday on the top section at Sina.com, the most popular news portal in China, under the headline, “More than a thousand Filipino workers demonstrated in Hong Kong to protest racial discrimination.”

Racial discrimination is usually not a hot topic among the Chinese public. The editors of Sina.com posted the story as a top one probably because it involves territorial disputes, which often catch the eyes of millions in China.

The several thousand comments made by readers under the article are intriguing. They vividly exhibit how the general public in China view national sovereignty and racial equality. Below are a dozen comments representing diverse viewpoints selected and translated by CDT:

—Domestic workers are human beings. They should be respected. This is a different matter from the territorial dispute over the Spratly Islands. On the other hand, overseas Filipino workers and their government should definitely respect history and respect China’s sacred territorial sovereignty, while their labor and dignity are respected.

—I support Tao Jie (Chip Tsao). What’s wrong with racial discrimination? Who treated the Chinese as human beings when the Joint Forces of Eight Nations invaded Beijing and during the Nanjing Massacre?

—The people in Hong Kong are very proud. They look down on mainland Chinese. Thus it’s not surprising that they look down on the Filipinos. In the 80s, the Hong Kong students in America never thought themselves as Chinese and never made friends with us mainland students.

—The people in Hong Kong show their patriotism by discriminating against their domestic servants. How ridiculous!That’s extremely ridiculous!!!

—Why do you employ Filipino workers if you are patriotic? Why can’t you look for mainland workers instead? Dispelling the Filipino domestic servants from Hong Kong and hiring mainland workers, you will create so many new jobs for us. That could be called real patriotism.

—Do not impose on others something you dislike! Why have we Chinese become so selfish today? Can’t we put ourselves in other people’s shoes? If we were them (the Filipinos), wouldn’t we stand up to defend our motherland? Think about the relations between China and Japan in the past…What’s the difference between our current behavior and the old conduct of the Japanese?

—We could just take them (the Filipino workers) as dogs which were barking in front of their masters. They don’t even deserve to be servants! I can’t help but feel superior when it comes to my mind that this country (the Philippines) was dependent on us during the Tang Dynasty!!

—I didn’t like Tao Jie before and regarded him as a lackey of foreigners. I was surprised that he actually loves the nation. I completely agree with his points. I will fire the Filipino worker at my home today and show my support through action.

—His patriotic remarks are too extreme! They don’t match with the mettle of a big power (as China).

—It takes courage to make an apology. We can not disrespect any people from any country.

—Tao Jie’s remarks are shameful. I can’t accept them! He inherited the tone of racist discrimination from the British colonists. We must criticize that.

—Tao Jie should learn to be smarter. He could have just kept those thoughts to himself. Why did he have to say it?

The above comments are selected from more 3,000 posted under the Sina.com article.

Asiasentinel.com published an article on the incident, Satire Lost In A Foreign Language, by Alice Poon.

A well-known Hong Kong journalist and blogger, Lv Qiu Lu Wei, also wrote a blog article A Patriotic Writer? commenting on the incident (in Chinese).
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- April 8, 2009 1:42 PM
Briton Jailed for China Protest

Matt Pearce, an English teacher living in Hong Kong, has been sentenced to six months in jail for staging a protest against China’s human rights record. From the BBC:

He hung banners on the Tsing Ma Bridge on 8 August last year - the opening day of the Beijing Olympics.

Pearce was found guilty of causing a public nuisance earlier this month but was cleared of a common assault charge.

In 2006, the veteran activist, who founded an organisation called International Action, was sentenced to 21 days in prison after dressing as Spiderman and scaling a giant television screen in the Central district of Hong Kong on the anniversary of the 1989 Tiananmen Square killings.
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- March 30, 2009 4:21 PM
Suzanne Pepper: Hong Kong’s Political Future

For the China Elections and Governance website, Suzanne Pepper reevaluates the relationship between Hong Kong and Beijing, now that more than a decade has passed since the handover:

Today, more than a decade has passed and international public opinion still deems Hong Kong’s transfer from British to Chinese rule a good job well done. Hence government officials, legal scholars, and investors continue to cite the Hong Kong precedent as a solution for other similar problems of disputed governance around China’s periphery including especially Taiwan and Tibet. This would be fine except that the precedent cited is already out-of-date since it is based on pre-1997 images and post-1997 appearances all carefully maintained by the principal stakeholders, that is, the Chinese, British, and Hong Kong governments. In such situations, of course, pretense cannot diverge too far from reality before cognitive dissonance sets in and for Hong Kong itself that point is fast approaching as the long-term implications of recent official Chinese decisions begin to appear. They suggest that some serious recalibration of the Hong Kong model is now in order.

See also a previous article by Pepper, “National security versus civil liberties: The case of China’s Special Administrative Regions.”
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- March 20, 2009 9:13 PM
Notice Banning Discussion of Guangdong Nansha Oil Project Environmental Impact Report

Guangdong Nansha integrated oil refinery and petrochemical project is a major inititiative, involving Kuwait National Oil Company and Guangdong Province. The project’s potential impact on the environment became a concern of not only the residents of Guangzhou, but also neighboring Hong Kong. On March 4, 2009, Hong Kong legislator Yu Ruohui raised this question, and the Director of the Environmental Protection Department in Hong Kong replied, saying, “As far as we understand, the impact assessment of the proposed project has yet to be approved.”

However, in the last few days, an internal notice from Internet supervision departments was sent to all major Chinese news websites, translated by CDT’s Japhet Weeks.

“Environmental impact report for the Guangdong Nansha integrated oil refinery and petrochemical project”: All internet sites are prohibited from reproducing, commenting on, or discussing anything relating to the content of this report. Nor should it be discussed on blogs. Furthermore, blogs should set up keyword filtering to make sure the topic isn’t discussed. All websites are requested to strictly implement these rules.

《广东南沙炼油化工一体化项目环境影响报告书》将于近日公示，公示期间，各网站对有关内容不转载、不报道、不评论，论坛、博客不讨论并设置关键词过滤。请各网站务必严格执行。

This notice aroused suspicion and anger among Chinese netizens, many of whom reposted and criticized it online. The environmental impact report itself has not yet been publicized online.

Previous citizens protests over large infrastructure and industrial projects have resulted in the projects being canned: See Xiamen PX and Shanghai Maglev.

Update:

* China Tries to Censor Info About Proposed Oil Refinery in Environmentally Sensitive Area by Mridul Chadha.

* The Curious Case of the Nansha Refinery on the China Environmental Law blog.
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- March 18, 2009 11:00 PM
Macau Law A ‘Bad Example’ For HK

From BBC News:

A new state security law has taken effect in Macau to punish crimes of treason, secession or subversion against the Chinese government.

It also punishes what it calls “preparatory acts” of these crimes, and the theft of state secrets.

Rights watchdogs have criticised the ambiguous, catch-all language of the law.

Democrat legislators have said the law in Macau is intended by China to set an example for less pliant Hong Kong.
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- March 3, 2009 9:48 PM
Li, Caijing Said to Be Planning News Venture in China

Richard Li, son of Li Ka-shing, plans to launch on online financial news service with Caijing Magazine. From Bloomberg:

The venture, which will focus its coverage on China, Hong Kong and Taiwan, may start operations by the end of the year, according to the people, who declined to be named because the plan is confidential. Journalists are being recruited for the mainly English service, two of the people said.

Li, the 42-year-old son of Hong Kong’s richest man, is raising investments in business media after Shanghai stocks rallied the most of any major market this year. Caijing, China’s top finance publication, may gain international readers through the partnership with Li, who controls the Hong Kong Economic Journal newspaper and the Now pay-television service.

[...] Plans for the Internet news venture are at a preliminary stage and details of the business model and distribution methods haven’t been completed, said three of the people.
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- February 27, 2009 12:55 PM
Reports: Chinese Martial Arts Novelist Liang Dies

From AP:

Liang Yusheng, a pioneer in Chinese martial arts novels, has died, news reports said. He was 85.

Liang died at his home in Sydney, Australia on Jan. 22, the Australian edition of the Hong Kong newspaper Sing Tao Daily reported Monday.

Luo Fu, the former editor of the now-defunct Sin Wan Bao newspaper, which hired Liang to write his first kung fu series, was quoted by Hong Kong’s Ming Pao Daily News on Tuesday as saying that Liang had died.

Liang, whose real name was Chen Wuntong, has been in poor health in recent years, diagnosed with bladder cancer in 2004 and suffering a stroke when he visited Hong Kong in 2007, Ming Pao said.

See also a post from Danwei on Liang’s death, which includes translations of Chinese media reports.
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- January 27, 2009 7:02 AM
China Warns on Fake Yuan Currency

Chinese officials are telling people to be wary of circulating fake currency notes. From BBC:

A People’s Bank of China statement said low-quality counterfeit detectors did not always manage to spot the fakes.

But it said the telltale signs could be spotted with the naked eye, and urged people to be vigilant.

“Though mostly counterfeit 100-yuan notes [worth $14.60] are not too hard to make out, people should be careful as cash transactions during the Spring Festival are high,” the bank statement said.

“The fake notes start with ‘HD90′ and are aimed at cheating detectors, and some poor-quality detectors are easy to cheat,” Ye Yingnan, of the central bank, was quoted by the Beijing News as saying.
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- January 9, 2009 10:29 PM