Of red flags raised, threats issued, and telling statistics about letters of complaints along with national security law arrests

 

Lion Rock in its unadorned glory

 

I didn't want to mention it on Sunday but on the same day as I was enjoying hiking out in the Sai Kung Peninsula and a kaito ride out of Sham Chung made memorable by multiple egret spottings, a party of pro-Beijingers hiked up Lion Rock and drape a flag of the People's Republic of China over its head.  It seems they saw this as a way to claim Lion Rock -- and, by extension, Hong Kong -- for the Motherland and as a (way belated) response to pro-democracy supporters doing such as hanging "I want genuine universal suffrage" banners from the iconic Hong Kong peak or installing "Free Hong Kong" signs atop it.  But in so doing, they actually made themselves look bad by, among other things, betraying a lack of knowledge about traditional practices with regards to flags! 

 

For, as more than one person more knowledgable about such things pointed out on Twitter, flags are meant to be flown, not laid flat on the ground.  Also, the draping of the flag on top of Lion Rock brought to mind the draping of the flag on corpses (of such as deceased leaders like Mao Zedong, who lay in state with a flag draped over his body after his death).  So were those who draped the Communist Chinese flag over Lion Rock announcing that Hong Kong's dead and/or inviting bad feng shui onto Hong Kong or maybe themselves?  (A Tweeted suggestion regarding the implications of this action: "The red flag might awaken the sleeping Lion and prompt more people to rebel against the worsening autocratic rule"!)    

 

Within 24 hours or so, the Hong Kong Twitterverse's attention had turned its attention to the Wall Street Journal having published a letter to the American newspaper's editor from Hong Kong’s Secretary for Constitutional and Mainland Affairs Erick Tsang under the eye-catching title of "Hong Kong Issues a Threat to the WSJ"!   A number of people (including Bloomberg's Matthew Brooker and the Hong Kong Free Press' Tom Grundy) felt compelled to fact check and critique Erick Tsang's letter threatening law enforcement action against the newspaper for simply having described the reality that “boycotts and blank ballots are one of the last ways for Hong Kongers to express their political view" in one of their articles.  

 

A political commentator (whose Twitter handle is @Baakfanmouyan) stated that Erick Tsang was engaging -- like too many Hong Kong government officials have been prone to doing -- in an attempt to gaslight: in this case, by "claiming that basic civil liberties are protected while *in the same letter* threatening a news organization for exercising basic civil liberties".  Perhaps the best response of all to Erick Tsang's letter may be Alvin Lum's.  More specifically, in direct response to the Secretary for Constitutional and Mainland Affairs' statement that “every government would want its residents to cast valid votes in any election”, the Citizen News reporter found that back in 2010, then Hong Kong Chief Executive Donald Tsang and his ministers publically as well as collectively boycotted a by-election that took place that year!

 

And Alvin Lum it was too who's discovered and publicized the fact that in this calendar year, the Hong Kong government has already sent over 130 letters [of complaint or "clarification"] to various foreign media, mostly in response to news stories and opinion pieces on the national security law or the electoral changes that have been effected. And on multiple occasions, they have sought to claim that the national security law wasn't "draconian", or that the media have been "twisting the facts" to suggest that Apple Daily executives were "arrested for doing journalism".  (Upon reading Alvin Lum's Tweet, Renaud Harrcart responded with the following Tweet of his own: "Tell us you’re an authoritarian regime that doesn’t believe in the freedom of the press without…"!)

 

Another telling statistic was Tweeted this week -- this time by AFP's Xinqi Su: "According to the [national security law] arrest tally we keep, November 2021 is the first month since [the law] came in force when [the] national security police in [Hong Kong]] did not make any arrest. From Oct 27 to Nov 30, total arrests remain the same as 155 persons aged 15 to 79."

 

My initial reaction when seeing this Tweet was: Thank goodness for small mercies that there have been no additional arrests since October 27th.  But then I couldn't help but notice the age range of the 155 people arrested.  Put another way: the fact that the authorities would consider people aged as young as 15 years and as old as 79 years could be considered serious national security threats would be laughable, if it wasn't so upsetting.  

 

Speaking of which: one of the septuagenarians facing national security law charges will turn 74 tomorrow.  I wish Apple Daily founder Jimmy Lai could and will have a happy birthday tomorrow.  Given the circumstances, I just hope that he will be granted some modicum of peace and measure of kindness, and that there will be fewer political ructions on his 74th birthday than there was on his 73rd.