Invisible Nation helps to make Taiwan (more) visible (Film review)

 

Seen on the fourth day of my most recent Taiwan trip

 

Invisible Nation: Extended Cut (USA-Taiwan, 2024)

- Vanessa Hope, director and co-producer (along with four others)

 

I first heard about Invisible Nation soon after its September 2023 debut at the Woodstock Film Festival.  But with things being the way they now are in Hong Kong (with not only a number of Hong Kong protest documentaries not being allowed to be screened in cinemas but, also, certain films from Taiwan and elsewhere that were apparently adjudged to have breached the national security law), I held little hope of being able to view this documentary about Taiwan that was shot for the most part during Tsai Ing Wen's presidency. (Filming of the documentary began in May 2017, one year after she assumed office.)

 

So imagine my surprise upon discovering earlier this week that that which is listed as the extended cut of the film (yet is 82 minutes long, in contrast to the 85 minutes listed length (on IMDB) of the original version!) made available on the PBS platform is available to view in Hong Kong (as well as the USA) sans VPN!  And to confirm that, as of a few minutes ago, this documentary remains available to view, and for free too!

 

Invisible Nation begins with beautiful, peaceful vistas of a green tropical land with seas and urban along with rural scapes.  It then proceeds to show a smiling Tsai Ing Wen meeting school students and telling them that she hoped to learn from them "what you hope your country can do for you."  

 

Right there and then, it's made clear that Taiwan is a distinct place, and most definitely a democracy.  So one feels quite the frisson when the film then follows up with a view of The Great Wall of China and the sound of Chinese leader Xi Jinping stating that "Taiwan is part of China".  The People's Republic of China, it is implied.  In other words: non-democratic, authoritarian, Communist China.

 

Over the course of Invisible Nation, one also learns of how, in addition to denying that Taiwan is an independent nation, the government over in Beijing does its utmost to deny Taiwan visibility in the world -- and how the world for the most part, including world organizations like the United Nations and International Olympic Committee and other international sports bodies, goes along with it; with Taiwan not being a member nation of the United Nations, and Taiwanese sportsmen and sportswomen having to compete these days in international tournaments under the name "Chinese Taipei" and the Taiwanese national anthem not being allowed to be played when Taiwanese athletes win at the Olympics.

 

Despite it looking to be a David versus Goliath battle, Taiwan -- especially during the presidency of Tsai Ing Wen -- is not taking all this lying down.  (Why would it?  Especially when we know that in the Old Testament tale, David beat Goliath!)  And what Invisible Nation also makes clear is that Taiwan's existential struggle is two fold: with one part involving Taiwan working to stay politically independent and democratic; and the other part telling Taiwan's story to the world.

 

With Invisible Nation helping to fulfill the latter task, it's easy to see that there are people who will accuse it of being a propaganda work.  And for sure, Vanessa Hope does present Taiwan in a friendlier light than the People's Republic of China.  Ditto with regards to Taiwan's first female president (who, after serving two terms, has been succeeded by her vice-president, William Lai Ching Te -- as an afterword in the extended cut points out) being presented in a more favourable manner than Communist China's "president for life" (who assumed the offices of General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party and Chairman of the Central Military Commission back in 2012)!

 

At the same time though, Invisible Nation does present facts and figures, not just biases and vibes.  The documentary also does provide a historical perspective and portrait of a culturally diverse people that is helpful in allowing people to understand the overall situation and picture; one that, frankly, can come across as very complex and complicated, and overwhelm those who come into a viewing of this film with (next to) zero prior knowledge of East Asia -- though my own sense is that Vanessa Hope pitched this at just the right level, so that you don't have to be a complete East Asian political wonk to be able to comprehend and follow it all!

 

My rating for this film: 8.5          

The 35th anniversary of the 35th of May

  

In memory of the victims of the Tiananmen Square Massacre

 

Hong Kong still remembers.  We are no longer allowed to hold candlelight vigils in Victoria Park to commemorate June 4th.  But we still most definitely remember, and many of us still have lit candles and mourned this evening -- these days, for what has been lost in Hong Kong since China imposed a national security law on Hong Kong (on June 30th, 2020) as well as was lost in Beijing all those years ago. :(

The verdict has been delivered by the national security judges in the trial of the Hong Kong 47 but it ain't over yet by a long chalk!

  

Mood this week in Hong Kong

 

It's not yet over but here's stating all the same that it's been one hell of a crap week in Hong Kong.  Never mind the bad weather (which has included typhoon warnings getting issued -- thanks, Typhoon Maliksi!).  Though I must say that the gray days and weeping skies have felt reflective of many people's moods.     

 

The day after the first arrests under Article 23 were made, a seventh individual was apprehended -- also over "seditious posts" by and on a Facebook page known as the ChowHangTung club that appear to be nothing more than "daily posts in memory of the events in Tiananmen Square and the vigils held in Hong Kong until 2019 to remember them"!  ("The initiative", a P.I.M.E. Asia news piece explains, "is linked to Chow’s legal battle. She was arrested for her role in organising commemorations in Victoria Park. For this reason, she has been in prison since September 2021, and is still awaiting trial after almost three years.")

 

As Freedom House research director Yaqiu Wang observed in a piece in The Diplomat: "The fact that the authorities keep throwing new charges at Chow for the one thing she did – organize commemorations to honor those killed by their government for peacefully demanding freedom and democracy – only speaks to the insecurity that she inspires in her own government and in Beijing."

 

Something also worth point out -- which Wang does in her piece: "Beijing’s determination to crush Hong Kong’s freedoms and to erase history is illustrated by the multiple, years-long prosecutions against Chow. However, Chow’s courage and resolve in the face of this repression exemplify Hong Kongers’ collective determination to fight back." 

 

In a development that now passes for a "Thank goodness for small mercies" one, all of those arrestees -- bar for Chow Hang-tung, who was already behind bars at the time of her arrest on this (new) charge -- have been granted bail.  One way in which many of us found this out was by seeing a photo of one of the six, Lee Ying-chi (a dentist by profession), waiting in line to get into court to see and hear on Thursday morning the verdict being given of the Hong Kong 47.  

 

The day before the verdict of the largest political trial in Hong Kong's history was due to be handed out, an observer Tweeted that "If this goes the way GovHK wants it to go, they're never going to shake the optics of arresting/convicting political opponents for the crime of having a strategy to legally win an election they were never supposed to win that also stood a real chance of succeeding"; and "They can scream all they want about subversion and foreign forces etc, and maybe they even believe it, but to everyone else in actual democracies it's going to look like exactly what it is -- an authoritarian govt jailing political enemies who had too much public support". 

 

Sadly, that's what came to pass.  For more than three years and three months after 47 organizers and participants of a pro-democracy primary staged in 2020 were arrested on February 28th, 2021, the three hand-picked national security law judges decided that only two of the individuals concerned were innocent of the conspiracy to commit subversion charges laid on them.   

 

"In a summary of the verdict distributed to media, the court said the [other] election participants had declared they would use their legislative power to veto the budgets" -- ooooh, so bad!  Put another way: In the words of journalist Ryan Ho Kilpatrick, "they tried to win an election."  And, added a member of the diasporic Hong Kong Twitterverse, "In the most peaceful, democratic way."

 

Still, lest barrister (and ex-cop as well as district councillor) Lawrence Lau and former district councillor (and registered social worker) Lee Yue-shun, who made history by being the first two people tried under the Beijing-imposed national security law to be cleared of their charges think it's all over, "Director of Public Prosecutions Maggie Yang on Thursday afternoon said that she had received instruction from Secretary for Justice Paul Lam that the justice department would seek to appeal the acquittal of Lau and Lee." Of course!  

And with mitigation hearings and appeals by at least some of those found guilty also still to come, this case is set to run through the summer; with sentencing not taking place for some months yet.  During which, the stress and misery for many, if not all, of the people involved will continue.  (Reading the piece of AP's Kanis Leung on the toll of Beijing's national security law on Hong Kong's activists before the verdict was already heartbreaking.) 

  

Adding to the tragedy and/or farce of it all, five members of the League of Social Democrats (including Chan Po-ying, the group's head and spouse of "Long Hair" Leung Kwok-hung, one of the Hong Kong 47) were arrested after attempting to stage a protest outside the courthouse on Thursday afternoon.  In another "Thank goodness for small mercies": they were released a day later (i.e., yesterday). 

More than by the way, Chan Po-ying is the subject of a piece by AFP's Xinqi Su which appears on the Hong Kong Free Press' website today with headlines that emphasize that she's spent decades fighting for democracy with Long Hair -- and has continued to do so after his national security law arrest.  The following is how the piece concludes -- and I think is a good way to conclude this blog post:

Chan said it was important that people keep speaking up.

“What we have been trying to emphasise is that we don’t want society to be voiceless,” she said.

“When there is no other narratives than the one and only official version, I think as a humble citizen and resident, it’s our duty to history that we shall not let others alter our history and memories,” she added.

 (My emphasis.)

The first six Article 23 arrests get people thinking all the more of June 4th (and this even while it's still only May)!

  

Victoria Park one week before the 35th anniversary

of the Tiananmen Square Massacre

 

I had a dream last night in which Lee Cheuk-yan, was walking around talking to people at an event I was attending; prompting to wonder to myself, "Wait, isn't he supposed to be in prison?"

 

For the record: I don't normally dream about public figures/political prisoners.  But I guess my subconscious turned my being all too aware that we're just one week away from the 35th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square Massacre into a dream about the former chair of the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China: that is, the organisation behind the (once) annual June 4th candelight vigils in Victoria Park -- the last of which I was at in 2019.   

 

One reason why I may have been thinking of the upcoming Tiananmen Square Massacre anniversary last night was because yesterday afternoon, as the bus I was taking passed by Victoria Park, my attention was caught by a greater police presence than usual on an edge of the public park.  It's nothing compared to what I imagine will be the case come June 4th (or probably even this weekend -- the weekend leading up to it) based on what's happened in recent years.  

 

And this on top of the now usual "refurbishments" being made at this time of the year to the football pitches where the June 4th candelight vigils used to take place.  Oh, and this year, there's also a very "red" looking event scheduled to take place in the area too -- one whose advertising mentions the dates 6/1, 6/2, 6/3 and 6/5 but not 6/4!  (For those who didn't realize: the Chinese way of writing dates is like the American one in placing the month before the day.) 

 

And after today's events, I'm thinking I'll be dreaming tonight of Lee Cheuk-yan's erstwhile Hong Kong Alliance comrade and fellow poliical prisoner, Chow Hang-tung -- who was one of the six people arrested today by the Hong Kong national security police "on suspicion of acting with seditious intention", marking the first apprehensions under the city’s new security law, which was enacted this past March.  (And yes, here's confirming that she, who already is behind bars, was arrested again... and for an alleged crime involving social media posts... even though she does not have access to a computer while behind bars!)

Somewhat bizarrely, "Secretary for Security Chris Tang confirmed... that the arrests were made in connection with a Facebook group that called for support for barrister and human rights activist Chow, who has been detained under the Beijing-imposed national security law since September 2021. The group was created on May 18, 2023, and the primary location for those that managed it was the UK.

 

It was also reported by the Hong Kong Free Press that: "The posts were said to have made use of an “upcoming sensitive date” to incite hatred against the central and Hong Kong governments, as well as the Judiciary. Police also alleged that the posts intended to incite netizens to organise or participate in illegal activities at a later time."

 

As Eero Kivistö, a self-described "guy from Finland posting random political ramblings", incredulously Tweeted in reaction to the news of Chow Hang-tung's further arrest: "Let me get this straight: an activist that has been detained since 2021 was arrested under a law that took effect in March? Seriously?"  Sadly, yes.  Also, this time around, the police arrested Chow Hang-tung's mother too!  (No, I am not kidding.  I wish I was but I'm not.) 

By the way, mention of Chow Hang-tung's mother got me thinking, of course, of the Tiananmen Mothers, the Chinese democracy activists promoting a change in the government's position over the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre led by the now 87-year-old Ding Zilin, a retired university professor whose teenage son was shot and killed by government troops during the protests. (What can I say?  That's how my brain works!)  

 

It's pretty incredible that they've sought justice and change for some 35 years now.  And while it's incredibly sad that their pursuit has thus far been in vain, they really are to be admired, if not supported, for their persistence throughout the three and a half decades.

 

As are the likes of Lee Cheuk-yan and those Hong Kongers who have sought the same -- and for many, the same amount of time.  And have been persecuted for doing so.  A Hong Kong Democracy Council Tweet noted that: "[With] today's 6 arrests there've been in all 76 arrests in #HongKong for commemorating #June4 #TiananmenMassacre since candlelight vigil was banned in 2020. Chow Hang-tung's been arrested 4 times for marking June 4 & is awaiting trial on remand for her role as organizer of the vigil".

 

I'm willing to bet that before 2020, no one in Hong Kong was arrested with regards to commemorating the Tiananmen Square Massacre. This not least because the annual candlelight vigils in Victoria Park were peaceful affairs; with the tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of people who took part in them being there to mourn, remember and honour the dead doing so in a thoroughly respectful and respectable manner.

By the way, the authorities can't seem to bring themselves to actually name the "upcoming sensitive date".  I trust that I've written the date enough times in this blog entry so that there's no mistaking which date is the one that is in question and at issue here.  Also, to be clear: despite their efforts to make it so, I sincerely doubt that Hong Kong has become part of the People's Republic of Amnesia -- or will anytime soon.  This not least because all their attempts to stop people commemorating June 4th only get people remembering it all the more!

A guilty verdict in a trial involving actor Gregory Wong gets people thinking that so much, if not everything, is wrong!

  

Still image of Gregory Wong at Admiralty from 

 Memories to Choke On, Drinks to Wash Them Down

 

This has been one of the weeks where so much has happened (including announcements that make people realize that the dreaded Article 23 may be pushed through faster than many of us had hoped) that I lost track of the days and thought for a time yesterday that today was going to be Friday, only to realize after a while that today's still just Thursday.  But let me focus today's blog post on just one subject: today's judgement by Magistrate Li Chi-ho at the end of a 34 trial in which six defendants stood accused of "rioting" on July 1st, 2019.  

 

Firstly, let's note for the record that Magistrate Li found four of the defendants, including actor Gregory Wong, guilty as charged.   We'll get back to Gregory Wong shortly but here's focusing now on the two defendants found not guilty of rioting: Wong Ka-ho, who was then a a reporter with a student publication at the City University of Hong Kong; and Ma Kai-chung, who then was a reporter with Passion Times.  Sadly, they did not get off scott free.  Specifically, Magistrate Li found the duo guilty of  "entering or staying in the precincts of the [Legislative Council] chamber" that a number of pro-democracy protestors had illegally stormed that day.

 

A reminder in a Hong Kong Free Press article about today's judgement of that event that was labelled "Taking Back the Legislature" (the title of a 2020 documentary film that I managed to view but which is no longer allowed to be screened in public in Hong Kong): "That night, protesters occupied the government building, smashing windows and spray-painting protest slogans on the walls. Some left by around 11 pm, according to the case details.  Police officers did not stop the storming. By the time officers entered the building, all protesters had left, according to a police watchdog report" (my emphasis).

 

As early as the night of July 1st, 2019, itself, people were pondering the following:"Seems possible, even probable, that the police and authorities in Hong Kong purposely retreated to create the circumstances and images that would justify a stronger backlash. Surely they had the means and the force to prevent the legislature being stormed... if they wanted to."  (This from France 24 journalist, James Creedon.)  

 

A little over a week later, Stephen Vines's July 9th, 2019, Hong Kong Free Press piece was headlined: Was Hong Kong's protestors' occupation of the legislature a dangerous trap laid by the police?" and in it, he noted that Fernando Cheung -- one of the many pro-democracy legislators (including the jailed  since February 28th, 2021, likes of Claudia Mo and Lam Cheuk-ting) who had tried in vain to stop protestors from breaking into the Legislative Council building -- had suggested precisely that.  And today's judgement looks to have proven Fernando Cheung, now no longer in Hong Kong (and, instead, one of the many Hongkongers who have emigrated in recent years to Canada) right.

 

Returning to Gregory Wong: he had pleaded not guilty and "told the court he entered the legislative council solely to deliver two chargers to reporters who were covering the break-in by protesters.  According to video evidence played by the prosecution, Wong left the chamber immediately after delivering the chargers to a reporter in a yellow vest."  And yet he was found guilty.  

The case magistrate, according to a Reuters report, "said Wong could have met the reporter outside the Legislative Council, so as to not "take risk to get in, and serve the purpose of helping others"."  According to an Associated Press (AP) report, magistrate Li also noted that Wong "had hugged a protester before leaving the chamber as an expression of support."  From this, magistrate Li surmised that Wong's “intention of entering the legislature is obvious, it is to join this riot"!

As a friend was moved to state upon hearing this: Jesus wept!  For as the Hong Kong netizen who goes by John dEFROG on Twitter pointed out: "This has been a common theme among all the rioting convictions: if you were on the scene and/or treated protesters like human beings and not one-dimensional villains, or you weren't actively trying to stop them, you're guilty of whatever they were doing."  And to follow up: "I've said it before, but I still believe this is the legal equivalent of being convicted of bank robbery because you were in or standing next to the bank while it was being robbed."

 

Also note what happened to another of the defendants, as detailed in the AP piece: Lam Kam-kwan "was convicted of rioting and a separate charge of criminal damage Thursday, had been detained in mainland China in August 2019 and had been forced to write a repentance letter. Lam said some Hong Kong police officers later met him and told him that if he would not admit his wrongdoing, he then could not return to the city."  Does that sound like a forced confession to you?  Because that's what it sounds like to me!

 

For the record: this was a jury-less trial.  I can imagine a trial by jury producing different verdicts.  So, yeah, it can feel when reading judgements like today's that, to quote a lawyer in a legal drama that did involve a jury trial -- and which I described in my review of it as representing "wishful thinking or plain fantasy on the part of its makers.  Or, alternatively, a reminder of how justice should be served" -- like "Everything is wrong", sadly enough! :(

Debutant director Sasha Chuk tells a very personal story indeed via Fly Me to the Moon (Film review)

  

The principal cast members and producer Stanley Kwan 

at a post-screening photo session and Q&A 

 

Fly Me To the Moon (Hong Kong, 2023)

- Sasha Chuk, director-scriptwriter

- Starring: Sasha Chuk, Wu Kang-ren, Chloe Hui, Yoyo Tse, Natalie Hsu, Angela Yuen

There is an achingly personal feel to this drama by first time feature film director Sasha Chuk who also wrote the screenplay for this cinematic adaptation of her (semi?) autobiographical novel and portrays the female protagonist as an adult.  Spanning two decades, Fly Me to the Moon begins its story in 1997 when the young Yuen (played by child actress Chloe Hui) and her mother arrive in Hong Kong to reunite with her father (portrayed throughout the film by Wu Kang-ren), who illegally immigrated to the then British Crown Colony, while her younger sister, Kuet, stayed behind in Hunan.

 

Able to only speak Hunanese, Yuen doesn't have an easy time at school and in other aspects of life.  And although her father has learnt to speak Cantonese and her mother soon gets a job as a waitress in a dim sum restaurant, life is not easy either for the adults in the family; as can be seen in the family living in a small sub-divided apartment, and her father turning to drugs for solace and ending up getting arrested and convicted shortly after the arrival -- to Yuen's delight -- of Kuet, who Yuen clearly adores.

 

Fast forward to 2007, and the girls are now at secondary school (with Yuen being played by Yoyo Tse) and successfully passing as native Cantonese-speaking Hongkongers; with Kuet (played as a teenager by Natalie Hsu) also being fluent in English and doing well at an elite school.  The sense one gets when watching them though is that they have consciously hidden not only the truth about their having come from Hunan from their schoolmates but, also, about their mother now working in a massage parlour and their father being a convict -- as all of these details would get them to be looked down upon, even ostracised, by even those who were supposed to be their friends.

 

If truth be told, the story of Mainland Chinese people moving to Hong Kong and finding life very hard in this city is one that's been told plenty of times before.  Ditto the notion that childhood experiences, including traumatising ones involving the father, stay with one into adulthood and affect the decisions one makes later in life -- with another recent Hong Kong film, Time Still Turns the Pages, showing that so very movingly and well.  (More than by the way, I do suspect that I would have been far more emotionally affected by Fly Me To the Moon if I hadn't viewed Nick Cheuk's standout offering only a few weeks ago.)  

 

Still, Fly Me to the Moon does undeniably impress at a technical level, with standouts in this regard including: Chan Hok Lun and Ho Yuk Fai's cinematography, whose images could often tell what a thousand words migh not; William Chang Suk-ping's production design which produced interiors that came across as authentic, be they cramped Hong Kong underclass dwellings, a Hunanese grandmother's rustic room or comfortable Tokyo hotel accomodation; and the acting talent on show, some of whom had to act in multiple languages on account of the film having Hunanese, Cantonese, Mandarin and Japanese dialogue!

 

The last includes Sasha Chuk -- who, in addition to her behind the camera roles, also appears in front of the camera as the adult Yuen in the scenes set in 2017.  There can be no denying that she is the heart and soul of Fly Me to the Moon -- and that she has laid bare her story as much as Yuen sought to hide her true identity, and often suppress her feelings, for much of her life.  As she told the audience at the film's world premiere at the Tokyo International Film Festival back in October, "I’m from Hunan and I moved to Hong Kong when I was a child. I spent all my life being treated as an outsider, including the time when I went to university overseas. So wherever I am, I am an outsider. And I really wanted to depict my experience."  And this she has done so, in spades.

My rating for the film: 7.0

A strange week for me, and quite the rubbish week for Hong Kong!

  

A reminder (from a member of the Yellow Economic Circle) 

that self care is important

 

This has been a bit of a strange week for me.  One evening saw me so very upset by something I read that I could feel my blood pressure rising, my actually feeling hot in the head and my hands literally shaking.  Another saw me feeling reflective and depressed post viewing a film looking at traumatic family experiences and how their effects are felt for decades.  And a third had me so affected by a late night discussion about what's been lost in Hong Kong in recent years that I ended up literally having a dream in which I detailed to my mother all the the things about pre national security law Hong Kong that I now miss so much.

 

Hence my not having been in the right frame of mind to do any blogging.  And all this while, life goes on and events like the national security law trial of Jimmy Lai continue to take place; with this week seeing the first witness for the prosecution take the stand.  Here's the thing though: I can't quite figure out from the reports what Cheung Kim-hung, the former publisher of the now-defunct Apple Daily, has said of his former boss that is actually incriminating!

For example, on Wednesday, Cheung said of his old boss that "“Mr. Lai has a very clear image. He advocates for democracy, freedom, and opposes totalitarianism".  Doesn't that sound more like an endorsement and praise than condemnation?  Also, what's illegal about that?!

 

Cheung also "said Lai, in 2019, told his senior editorial staff that the government proposal to amend the city’s extradition arrangement was an “infringement of Hongkonger’s democracy, freedom and human rights,” and the Chinese Communist Party would use the amendment to send “thorns in their side” to stand trial in the mainland."  Again, what's wrong and illegal about that?

 

And there's this: “Mr. Lai’s instruction was to use Apple Daily to encourage people to take to the street, to put up resistance [against the government],” Cheung said."  A reminder: not all street protests are illegal; especially those which are non-violent and got letters of no objection from the police -- which was the case with the vast majority of the anti-extradition bill and pro-democracy protest marches and rallies that took place in 2019, the year that Jimmy Lai gave those instructions.

 

As for this: "On the international level, Mr. Lai wanted to draw the attention from western democratic countries, hoping that they would offer some help, even some stronger measures such as placing sanctions on Chinese and Hong Kong officials.”  Again, this doesn't sound illegal or criminal to me.  Especially before China's imposition of the national security law on Hong Kong on June 30th, 2020!

In all honesty, much of what's going on these days doesn't seem to make much sense to me at all.  A case in point: the waste tax fiasco that had much of Hong Kong in uproar in recent days.  As Ming Pao journalist Alvin Lum noted, only partly -- even if actually -- in jest, "Forget about Article 23. The biggest challenge for officials might be waste charging"!

 

Another crazy thing that happened in Hong Kong this week: the M+ museum being made to not mention the name of a film that they nonetheless were allowed to screen.  (For the record: it was Beijing Bastards, a 1993 drama directed by Zhang Yuan!) Prompting the Federation of Hong Kong Filmmakers' spokesperson, Tenky Tin, to ask the entirely valid question: “From the point of view of a regular filmgoer, one has to wonder, how can you sell tickets for a film without disclosing its name?"!

 

Even more disturbingly, this week also saw the Hong Kong Arts Development Council (HKADC) withdraw its support for an annual drama awards ceremony, citing “inappropriate” arrangements last year and warning the organisers they must not breach the law; resulting in the Hong Kong Federation of Drama Societies (HKFDS) – which organises the Hong Kong Drama Awards -- not only losing its subsidy from the government advisory body but, also, being denied a venue to stage it after the Leisure and Cultural Services Department (LCSD) also told the drama federation that it would not be offering a venue for the event this year!

 

Rather than accept the HKADC's decision though, the HKFDS actually decided to publicly challenge it!  On Friday morning, the HKFDS's chairperson, Luther Fung , called a press conference to “defend the theatre industry’s dignity.”  In response to the HKADC's objections to two of last year's awards presenters having been  political cartoonist Wong Kei-kwan, known as Zunzi, and journalist Bao Choy, Fung asserted that "Zunzi is a veteran cartoonist – are cartoons not art? Choy is a documentary director – are documentaries not art?"

 

Addressing the HKADC, he said: ""You made an official decision without giving us a chance to defend ourselves, and that came as a shock to us,”... adding that there had been no official meetings between the council and the federation over the funding issue.  “We demand a clarification, and for accusations to be retracted — we will not file a so-called appeal,” said Fung. “[We’re] poor, but we have a backbone!”"

 

To which I say "kudos"!  And long may Hong Kongers have backbones and not be as easily bullied as the bullies might think and hope!

Of "seditious" t-shirts and flags, and relatives "under suspicion" in Hong Kong

  

Not everyone who has a boarding pass for a plane at Hong Kong

International Airport is allowed to board the plane... :S

 

The past 48 hours or so has seen, first, the parents and two sisters of Simon Cheng taken in for questioning by the Hong Kong police and then also the mother of Frances Hui.  Simon Cheng and Frances Hui are exiled Hong Kongers accused of breaking the national security law and consequently have had HK$1 million bounties placed on each of their heads by the Hong Kong government.  

 

Their relatives appear to have been harassed by the police because they happen to be the close relatives of these two activists: one of whom first made the news after he, who was then a British Consul worker, was detained and tortured by the Mainland police in 2019, and has since been granted asylum by the United Kingdom; the other of whom was the first Hong Konger granted asylum by the United States of America.  It doesn't sound like any of Simon Cheng or Frances Hui's relatives have been detained or arrested (though/thus far).  

 

Something that cannot be said of Chu Kai-poon, a 26-year-old Hong Konger who was arrested last November after a Hong Kong International Airport security guard spotted Chu wearing a long-sleeve top with the phrase “Liberate Hong Kong, revolution of our times,” on it and now has been jailed for three months for that "crime".  Yes, really. I wish I was kidding but I am not.

 

According to a government statement at the time, Chu was arrested near a boarding gate by police who had “sped to the scene.” Note: Chu was on his way OUT of Hong Kong at the time of his arrest. Did the police (seriously) think that he was going to do something like hijack or bomb the plane while wearing his "seditious" t-shirt (i.e., the one with the words "Liberate Hong Kong, Revolution of Our Times" -- which were often heard being chanted during pro-democracy protests in 2019 and 2020 -- on it)?

 

After he was apprehended, the police "also found three flags that bore the same slogan – as well as another t-shirt that had “Hong Kong independence” printed on it – in his possession." Note: he wasn't waving the flags around in the airport.  Instead, it sounds like they just were in his baggage.

 

As reported by the Hong Kong Free Press: "Designated national security judge Chief Magistrate Victor So said on Wednesday that the offence was less serious than in other sedition cases as it involved a small number of items and a relatively short period of time." More on the "relatively short period of time" bit: "The judge said that between leaving his residence and arriving at the airport, Chu only publicly demonstrated the protest slogan for five hours and 23 minutes."  

 

And yet he got a three month prison sentence for these "crimes"!  Something which I find pretty crazy; and so too does at least Samuel Bickett -- who, lest we forget -- is a trained lawyer (unlike me)!  Also, as he damningly pointed out in his Tweet about this sentencing and verdict: "Hong Kong law guarantees free speech in the Basic Law, bill of rights, and even the National Security Law. Yet every single judge who has heard these speech crime cases has ignored these guarantees."

 

For those of you outside of Hong Kong who've been thinking of visiting it: I know some of you may think that "Hong Kong politics are of no concern to me, I'm just here to eat/have fun/enjoy myself". And look, even I, who am very much concerned with Hong Kong's political situation, still eat and can have fun and enjoy myself here (and even take flights out of Hong Kong to spend time eating, having fun and enjoying myself out of it).  

 

But I also am very much aware of what is happening here, concerned with it and, well, yes, I have to admit that I sometimes wonder how much oppression/ludicrousness/curtailing of freedoms (including freedom of expression) around and also on me I'm willing to accept before I, too, will feel like I need to leave Hong Kong.:(

Jimmy Lai's national security law trial dominates the Hong Kong news on the first week of the new year

Never not feel shocked at seeing Jimmy Lai pictured 

in chains on the front pages of his own newspaper -- 

this from back in May 2021, when Apple Daily still existed

 

Jimmy Lai's national security law trial has finally got going in earnest this week.  On the first working day of 2024, the former media mogul formally "pleaded not guilty to conspiring to collude with foreign forces and publishing “seditious” materials".  "Wearing a dark-coloured jacket and a white shirt, the 76-year-old founder of pro-democracy newspaper Apple Daily, addressed the court for the first time on Tuesday since the trial began on December 18" and effectively confirmed that he's not going to go down without a fight even though the odds are clearly stacked against him thanks to his trial being jury-less and presided over by three judges handpicked by the authorities.

The prosecution begun delivering its opening statement after Lai had submitted his not guilty pleas.  And pretty soon, it became obvious that some -- if not all -- of the aspects of the arguments it seeks to make can seem very questionable from the viewpoints of many observers.

For example, the court was given a list of people named as “co-conspirators” that included a former US consul-general to Hong Kong (James Cunningham), the founder of the Global Magnitsky Justice Campaign (Bill Browder) and a former Japanese Member of the Diet (Japanese Parliament) (Shiori Kanno).  This even though Jimmy Lai had never met or spoken to some of them -- this according to some of them (E.g., Bill Browder)!  And here's this from another person named as a co-conspirator -- Hong Kong Watch's Benedict Rogers: "People who simply campaigned for democracy deemed "co-conspirators" with Jimmy Lai[.] People who simply spoke with him are "collaborators"[.] Who next? Everyone who bought Apple Daily?"

Then, on Wednesday, the prosecutors sought to make a big deal out the fact that Jimmy Lai "Followed" a number of foreign politicians on Twitter.  (Note: This was actually mentioned back in December 2020, and thought to be absurd then!)  In a sign of how weak such a charge is, even at least one of the three national security judges presiding over the case, Alex Lee, didn't find this all that damning. “He’s interested in international affairs, so?” was apparently his reaction!

Rather understandably, Caoilfhionn Gallagher, the British King's Counsel who's the leader of Jimmy Lai's international team, was moved to Tweet that: "Today’s developments in [Jimmy Lai’s] trial are ludicrous. It is now clear he is being tried for: conspiracy to commit journalism; conspiracy to talk about politics to politicians; & conspiracy to raise human rights concerns with human rights organisations. This farce must end."

But continue, it has.  And so has the pointing out of holes galore in the prosecution's case.  For example, yesterday (Thursday) saw Samuel Bickett (who, remember, is a trained lawyer as well as a political activist) pointing out that "the prosecutor [had] focused on ads Lai allegedly funded calling for the world to support Hong Kong’s [extradition bill turned pro-democracy] protests. They were published in Aug 2019, almost a year before Beijing imposed the [National Security] Law under which Jimmy is now charged".  

Here's the issue: "It is a fundamental principle that laws only apply to future acts, not past ones. For Jimmy, the court is simply choosing to ignore that principle. Beijing said in the lead up to the NSL’s passage that the law would not be applied retroactively." (See this for the record.)

Yesterday also saw Jimmy Lai's international legal team file an urgent appeal with the United Nations special rapporteur on torture regarding one of the key prosecution witnesses in Lai’s trial; pointing out that "there is “credible evidence” that Andy Li, a 33-year-old former pro-democracy activist, was tortured while in prison in mainland China before he confessed to allegedly conspiring with Lai to collude with foreign forces." (For more details, see this Washington Post piece by Shibani Mahtani, and the book by her and Timothy McLaughlin that it's excerpted from, Among the Braves: Hope, Struggle, and Exile in the Battle for Hong Kong and the Future of Democracy (Hachette Books, 2023) -- which, against the odds, there are copies of here in Hong Kong.)  

As this farce proceeds, it's worth reading the following musings by Bloomberg's Matthew Brooker:  

In their quieter moments, do the more sensible people in Beijing ever wonder where the likes of CY Leung have led them to in Hong Kong. We are still waiting for the evidence of foreign black hands [behind the Umbrella Movement] that CY promised us almost a decade ago. And now look where we are…

They have destroyed businesses, jailed dozens of politicians and incarcerated 76-year-old Jimmy Lai on sedition and collusion charges — and still they have nothing to show for it, except the most mundane innocent contacts that are part and parcel of everyday life for journalists.

Lai is accused of doing what everyone else did in Hong Kong - including pro-Beijing politicians - in talking to foreign diplomats. And for this, they trashed Hong Kong’s international reputation and undermined trust in its rule of law. Do they think they got their money’s worth?

What they have produced so far couldn’t even be called thin gruel. It is nothing at all. All they have demonstrated is that they have no idea of how Hong Kong society functioned - no understanding of the distinct way of life they undertook to preserve.

Beijing always had the power to do this, whatever its promises. But was wrecking Hong Kong in this way really in China’s interests? It’s easy to see what it has lost, much harder to discern what it has gained.

Spotlight on Hong Kong, the national security law trial of Jimmy Lai, and prosecution witness Andy Li

 

Winter is -- and gray days are -- here in Hong Kong

 

This past Saturday, the temperatures dropped quite a bit and there's now a distinct chill in the air.  Still, it wasn't the cold air that made me shiver this morning but, rather, what I read in a piece by Shibani Mahtani for the Washington Post about what happened to Andy Li, a pro-democracy activist who's scheduled to be a key witness for the prosecution in the long-delayed national security trial of Jimmy Lai which finally got underway today. (How long delayed? Here's pointing out that he was arrested back in August 2020 and in and out of jail through to December 2020, when he was decisively denied bail and been behind bars since!)

 

The title of an article in The Guardian about the trial begins with the words "The world watches" -- and it does feel like Hong Kong is back in the international spotlight today.  Jimmy Lai's trial begins "two weeks after another landmark hearing came to an end on 4 December. The Hong Kong 47 mass trial of pro-democracy activists was the biggest national security law case since the legislation was implemented in Hong Kong in June 2020, quelling a year of protests against the tightening grip of the Chinese Communist party on the city. Lai’s trial has just one defendant. But," Amy Hawkins asserts, "it will be just as, if not more, significant for Hong Kong’s global standing."

 

"Lai, who turned 76 in jail this month, is charged with colluding with foreign forces under the national security law, as well as sedition. If convicted, which experts say is highly likely, the British national faces spending the rest of his life in prison."  Something noted there, which many people and media have not done so for much of this time, is that Jimmy Lai has a British passport -- a full fledged one as opposed to the "British National (Overseas)" passports issued to many Hong Kongers. But, due to his ethnicity, the authorities in Beijing -- and their proxies in Hong Kong -- consider him Chinese.  As well as an enemy of the Chinese state.

A reminder: the British government was a co-signer with the Chinese government of the Sino-British Joint Declaration. That 1984 document set the conditions in which then British-ruled Hong Kong was transferred to Chinese control and for the governance of the territory after 1 July 1997.  And it's the Sino-British Joint Declaration that had it that Hong Kong would be governed from July 1st, 1997, to June 30th, 2046, under something that came to be known as "One country, two systems": i.e., it would be part of the People's Republic of China but a Special Administrative Region that would enjoy a "high degree of autonomy" and, among other things, would have universal suffrage for its residents -- something which, of course, does not exist in the rest of China.

 

Returning to The Guardian's piece about Jimmy Lai's upcoming trial: "Lai’s trial is expected to run until spring 2024, with a verdict expected in autumn. It will be presided over by a panel of judges handpicked by the Hong Kong chief executive to handle national security cases.  Elaine Pearson, the Asia director for Human Rights Watch, [has] said [that] “Lai’s trial has been marred by serious violations of fair trial rights such as denying him a lawyer of his own choosing and handpicking judges. Beijing seems intent on imprisoning one of its most powerful critics for many years, possibly for the rest of his life.”"

 

Something else that is disturbing about the trial: its having witnesses for the prosecution like Andy Li.  A member of the Hong Kong 12 taken into custody in Shenzhen after a bid to flee to Taiwan by speedboat was foiled by Chinese coastguards, he looks to have been tortured while behind bars in Mainland China.

 

Quoting from Shibani Mahtani's piece: "Li, a 33-year-old gifted programmer who during the protests became a significant player in international lobbying and fundraising efforts, has already pleaded guilty under the national security law for his own role in the democracy movement, and he is expected to tie Lai to an alleged foreign conspiracy against Hong Kong and China. But Li was mistreated while in Chinese custody, a year-long Washington Post examination of the case found, raising questions about whether his testimony will be voluntary and reliable." 

 

Since returning to Hong Kong, Andy Li has been held in a Hong Kong psychiatric facility.  If that doesn't sound nuts and bad already, consider these passages from the Washington Post article which I find disturbing and chilling:  

For the first three months, according to several people familiar with the conditions, [the Hong Kong 12] were confined to these solitary cells, where two guards on shift took turns to watch them around-the-clock, even as they went to the bathroom. The lights were always on. During the day, they were forced to sit cross-legged on a concrete stool until their joints grew sore, except during mealtimes or interrogations. Walking around the cell was generally not permitted. At night, they were awakened at random hours, for no apparent reason. They were never allowed outside.

 

The interrogations were relentless during those initial months, the people familiar with the conditions said. Guards threatened to send them to Xinjiang — where the Chinese government has arbitrarily detained more than a million Muslim Uyghurs and subjected them to torture, forced sterilization, surveillance and other conditions, according to the United Nations — if they did not detail their attempted escape.

 

Most of the 12 were not physically abused, but seven people familiar with conditions at the center said screaming could “consistently” be heard coming from one cell: Li’s.

 

“It is likely that what [Li] faced inside was 10 times worse” than the rest, one person said.

If things were normal in Hong Kong, I think it would be safe to say that anything that Andy Li says at this point would be treated with suspicion as to its credibility.  Instead, the chance is extremely high that his words will be taken at surface value by the handpicked judges presiding over Jimmy Lai's trial.  And that in and of itself already will say a lot about whether justice can still truly be served, and served up, in Hong Kong in the national security law era.