Hong Kong's Show Trials: A Harbinger for the World
Image courtesy: Voice of America via Wikimedia Commons
If Hong Kong was “on the frontlines of a global battle for freedom” as Time magazine proclaimed during the city’s 2019 leaderless protests, then that struggle is certainly faltering, if not already lost. The democratic world is much the poorer for it.
Officials have parroted claims of vibrant civil liberties and judicial independence despite sweeping crackdowns in recent years. But the conclusion of the largest-ever national security trial last week has done nothing but prove otherwise, further cementing China’s tightening authoritarian grip on the city.
Judges, handpicked by authorities, passed down stiff sentences of up to 10 years to 45 leading activists, charged under the Beijing-imposed national security law. Earlier, they had convicted 18 of them who pleaded not guilty of conspiracy to commit subversion against the state in a jury-free trial. The irony is nothing short of tragic. Their crime? Standing at an unofficial primary in 2020. In hopes of commanding a majority, they had wanted to block bills and veto budgets through powers enshrined in law so the government would eventually heed to protesters’ demands of police accountability and democratic elections.
Out of four million registered voters, 610,000 voted in collective expression of hopes to be heard. Benny Tai, who allegedly masterminded the plot and got a 10-year term behind bars, was a highly decorated law professor. In the dock sat, not only, prominent faces like Joshua Wong and veteran legislators, but also students, social workers, academics, nurses, businessmen and professions across the social strata. They are the city’s brightest conscience. Their sentences are tantamount to a scornful repudiation of both those who voted, and the two million—in a city of seven million residents—who took to the street that scorching summer, in the face of live rounds and rubber bullets.
Prosecutors said the plan amounted to paralysing the government into a constitutional crisis, and the three justices sided with them. What’s at stake, however, is hope, independent thought, and the rich tapestry of individual voices—anything that refuses to conform to their predetermined narrative.
Election primaries and other freedoms that we take for granted are now threatened, here and elsewhere. Britain must not turn a blind eye. Keir Starmer twice refusing to condemn the sentences when pressed by journalists is hardly a promising start. The first Prime Minister to meet President Xi in six years, he spoke of resetting UK-China relations, and peppered his speech with references to China’s status as the world’s second largest economy.
But pursuing trade must not entail forsaking values and visions. Appeasement has proved futile in history. If human rights violations are not called out, they risk becoming fait accompli while the West kowtows to money.
Much has been said to lament the decimation of Hong Kong’s once-prosperous civil society, and it serves no purpose to repeat them here. In the bigger picture though, the world is losing a stronghold for democracy, a distinctive cultural hub fostering exchanges of ideas between the West and China. Democratic and non-democratic states are drifting apart. If Hong Kong was ever in a global battle, then we democracies are in retreat.
The public’s perception towards authoritarian leaders is more positive than ever. For the first time in 2022 there were more authoritarian states than democracies. We must resist the creeping temptation of “efficiency” under authoritarian rule. We must distinguish sensationalist demagogues by right-wing politicians from our political discourse amidst the rise of xenophobia in Europe and the States.
There are, perhaps, still causes to cling onto hopes. What freedom fighter Karis Nemik said in Andor best encapsulates why one should persevere: “The Imperial need for control is so desperate because it is so unnatural. Tyranny requires constant effort. It breaks, it leaks. Authority is brittle. Oppression is the mask of fear.”
We must vociferously defend the rights and freedoms of all communities, no matter how mundane they seem—for you never know who will be preyed on next.