{"id":2115,"date":"2022-07-01T16:23:00","date_gmt":"2022-07-01T20:23:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.merkley.senate.gov\/hong-kong-25-years-later-why-it-matters-for-the-us-22\/"},"modified":"2023-07-24T11:05:00","modified_gmt":"2023-07-24T15:05:00","slug":"hong-kong-25-years-later-why-it-matters-for-the-us-22","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.merkley.senate.gov\/es\/hong-kong-25-years-later-why-it-matters-for-the-us-22\/","title":{"rendered":"Hong Kong 25 a\u00f1os despu\u00e9s: por qu\u00e9 es importante para EE. UU."},"content":{"rendered":"

The fight for Hong Kong\u2019s autonomy faces a grim future on
\nthe 25th anniversary of the territory\u2019s handover back to China from the United
\nKingdom.<\/p>\n

What began on July 1, 1997, as a bold experiment seeking to
\nbring the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) more toward Western, liberal
\ndemocracies has instead served as a hard lesson in Beijing\u2019s single-minded
\npursuit of total control.<\/p>\n

There are few options for President Biden <\/a>and Congress to support
\nreversing Beijing\u2019s rollbacks on the democratic freedoms, capitalist economy
\nand rule of law in Hong Kong. <\/p>\n

Its supporters urge political asylum for opposition figures
\nand mourn the dimming of the territory\u2019s once bright light as a vibrant,
\ncosmopolitan center of culture and business that bridged the divide between
\nChina and the West. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt should be a warning to everyone around the world that a
\ncity of 7.5 million people who have enjoyed all the rights and autonomy that we
\ntake for granted globally \u2026 can be stripped away and taken away overnight,\u201d
\nsaid Samuel Chu, president of the Campaign for Hong Kong. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis crackdown doesn\u2019t stop at the Chinese border or the
\nborders of Hong Kong,\u201d he added.  <\/p>\n

Beijing\u2019s violations of Hong Kong\u2019s independence, which was
\nsupposed to stand for 50 years, also serve as a stark warning of the threats
\nfacing Taiwan.<\/p>\n

Top U.S. intelligence officials have said that Beijing\u2019s goal<\/a> is to undermine Taiwan
\nthrough diplomatic and economic pressure \u2014 but that it is also weighing a
\nmilitary invasion as the island hardens its political and military defenses,
\nwhich are backed by Washington. <\/p>\n

Jacob
\nStokes,<\/a> fellow for the Indo-Pacific Security Program at the Center for
\na New American Security, said that China\u2019s breach of \u201cone country, two systems\u201d
\nfor Hong Kong has sharpened the risks facing Taiwan and its democratic
\ngovernment.<\/p>\n

The 1984 Sino-British Joint Declaration, which laid the groundwork
\nfor Hong Kong\u2019s handover from the U.K. to China 13 years later, stated that
\nBeijing would treat the territory as a special administrative region \u2014 part of
\nthe larger country of China, but with its own separate, democratic system that
\nwas developed over a century and a half of British colonial rule.<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2018One country, two systems\u2019 eroded, sort of, like one goes
\nbankrupt, a little bit at a time and then all at once,\u201d Stokes said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s really sharpened a set of views, not just in Hong
\nKong, of course, but in Taiwan too, about what exactly closer political, legal,
\neconomic, technological integration with China would look like and has really
\nmade the choice quite stark.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Biden administration has elevated the Chinese Communist
\ngovernment as one the greatest security challenges facing the U.S. in the 21st
\ncentury. But Russia\u2019s invasion of Ukraine has inhibited the administration from
\nfocusing more strongly on countering Beijing.<\/p>\n

In Congress, Democrats and Republicans are united on the
\nneed to confront China but have stalled in advancing landmark legislation aimed
\nat setting up the U.S. to counter the nation \u2014 militarily, technologically,
\neconomically and diplomatically \u2014 for generations. <\/p>\n

\u201cLet\u2019s not wait any longer. Send it to my desk. I\u2019ll sign
\nit,\u201d Biden said in his State of the Union address to Congress this year. <\/p>\n

House and Senate lawmakers from both parties have been
\nmeeting since April to hammer out bipartisan text for the U.S. Innovation and
\nCompetition Act (USICA).<\/p>\n

On Thursday, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.)
\nsaid he would block advancing the USICA as long as Democrats were pursuing
\ntheir broad economic legislation without GOP buy-in.<\/p>\n

\u201cLet me be perfectly clear: there will be no bipartisan
\nUSICA as long as Democrats are pursuing a partisan reconciliation bill,\u201d
\nMcConnell tweeted.<\/p>\n

Sen. Todd
\nYoung <\/a>(R-Ind.), a co-sponsor of the first USICA that cleared the
\nSenate in 2021, called for passing bipartisan text \u201cwithout any further delays\u201d
\nin a statement to The Hill.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen Beijing took over Hong Kong and crushed the brave Hong
\nKongers rising up to defend their democracy, it served as a wake-up call to the
\nworld that we must take the Chinese Communist Party at their word when they
\ndiscuss their ambitions,\u201d Young said.<\/p>\n

\u201cLike Hong Kong, destroying Taiwan\u2019s independence is not
\ntheoretical or academic, but something that Beijing is determined to
\naccomplish. We must use this occasion to express our resolve that this cannot
\noccur.\u201d<\/p>\n

Provisions related to Hong Kong in draft text of a House
\nbill include prohibitions on certain exports to the territory, funds to promote
\ndemocracy, monitoring of China\u2019s interference in Hong Kong\u2019s trade and
\nindustrial policies and providing visas for Hong Kong dissidents who are
\ntargets of the Chinese government.<\/p>\n

\u201cHong Kong really represents the most potent and promising
\nbase of resistance to the Communist regime in China,\u201d Chu said. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt means preserving whatever memory, talent and people that
\nwe can, either through supporting them in an overseas diaspora or supporting
\nwhat they\u2019re doing underground.\u201d<\/p>\n

The CCP has accelerated its crackdown on Hong Kong\u2019s
\ndemocratic freedoms and institutions most prominently since 2019, installing
\npro-Beijing politicians in the territory and passing a National Security Law
\n(NSL) that criminalized vague offenses of terrorism, secession and subversion
\nwith the maximum penalty, going as far as life in prison. <\/p>\n

More than 10,000 people were arrested when protesting the
\nNSL at that time, with more than 2,300 charged for crimes under the law and 200
\nconvicted, as
\ndocumented in a report<\/a> by the Congressional Research Service that was
\npublished in March.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe HKSAR [Hong Kong Special Administrative Region]
\nincreasingly seems to be wielding the NSL as an instrument of political
\nrepression, and has censored pro-democracy media outlets and arrested their
\nleadership and senior editorial staff,\u201d the report states. <\/p>\n

Biden has so far maintained former President Trump\u2019s 2020
\nexecutive order to suspend Hong Kong\u2019s special status as separate from Beijing
\nas it relates to U.S. policy on trade, politics and diplomacy. <\/p>\n

The U.S. has also, since 2020, imposed visa and economic
\nsanctions on more than two-dozen Hong Kong and Chinese officials determined to
\nbe responsible for undermining the territory\u2019s democracy, autonomy and loss of
\nrights for Hong Kong residents. <\/p>\n

Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle are calling for
\nsustained U.S. focus on condemning China\u2019s subversion of Hong Kong and
\nsupporting its democratic activists.<\/p>\n

But such action faces a steep uphill battle with competing
\nsecurity priorities such as Russia\u2019s war in Ukraine, threats from Iran over its
\nnuclear weapons ambitions, humanitarian crises across the world and domestic
\nwoes from inflation to political polarization on guns and abortion. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe recognize that the task of restoring the promise of an
\nautonomous Hong Kong requires the sustained effort by the United States and the
\ninternational community to push back against the erosion of political and civil
\nrights by Chinese and Hong Kong authorities fearful of these rights,\u201d Sen. Jeff
\nMerkley (D-Ore.) and Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.), chairs of the bipartisan and
\nbicameral Congressional-Executive Commission on China, said in a statement. <\/p>\n

Stokes, of the CNAS, said that while \u201ca lot of the damage
\nhas already been done,\u201d the U.S. and international community can \u201ccontinue to
\nshine a light on repression in Hong Kong.\u201d<\/p>\n

Chu agreed, saying that \u201cwe\u2019re in a very low point right
\nnow, I think that nobody\u2019s disputing that.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\u201cBut I believe, and I think that with support, and ongoing
\nprioritizations of Hong Kong as an issue, Hong Kong will remain that base for
\nresistance. But they really need help right now.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The fight for Hong Kong\u2019s autonomy faces a grim future on the 25th anniversary of the territory\u2019s handover back to China from the United Kingdom. What began on July 1, 1997, as a bold experiment seeking to bring the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) more toward Western, liberal democracies has instead served as a hard lesson […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2115","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-in-the-news"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nHong Kong 25 years later: Why it matters for the US - Merkley<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.merkley.senate.gov\/es\/hong-kong-25-years-later-why-it-matters-for-the-us-22\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"es_MX\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Hong Kong 25 years later: Why it matters for the US - Merkley\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The fight for Hong Kong\u2019s autonomy faces a grim future on the 25th anniversary of the territory\u2019s handover back to China from the United Kingdom. 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