https://www.wsj.com/articles/why-hong-kong-matters-11560466365
The young demonstrators in Hong Kong this week have done the world a favor. In calling attention to their plight, they are educating the rest of us in the nature of President Xi Jinping’s Communist Party rule in Beijing. Donald Trump in particular should be listening—and speaking up.
The demonstrators—and the million Hong Kongers who marched peacefully Sunday—object specifically to a pending law that would allow extradition from the territory to the Mainland. The people know this will put anyone who criticizes China in jeopardy of being sent to the Mainland for almost certain conviction and punishment. Hong Kong’s legacy of British law will still control—except in cases where China decides otherwise.
The official disclaimers from Hong Kong chief executive Carrie Lam that China has no such intentions are meaningless. She was appointed by Beijing and takes her orders accordingly. She is insisting on moving ahead with the law despite the mass protests because China has demanded it. Her job, and perhaps her own future freedom, would be jeopardized if she dared to resist.
The new law is itself a violation of China’s promise to Hong Kong that it could continue to control its legal system for 50 years after its handover from the British in 1997. As these columns wrote in 1984 after Margaret Thatcher struck her deal with Deng Xiaoping, “the essence of the [joint] declaration is that five million largely free people will soon have their futures determined by a totalitarian government not known for tolerance or stability.” We urged Britain to amend its Nationality Act to admit to England all Hong Kongers who wanted to leave.
