Hong Kong pro-democracy tycoon Jimmy Lai gets 20 years' jail

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c8d5pl34vv0o

151•tartoran•2h ago

Comments

SilverElfin•1h ago

Sad that the international community doesn’t do more to intervene in Hong Kong, Xinjiang, and Tibet. As a reminder, China has violated the treaty around Hong Kong’s handoff. So really the UK and the rest of the world should have demanded its return.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sino-British_Joint_Declaration

Galanwe•1h ago

The UK was happy to ignore the violation of the handover agreements and offer BNO passports to steal all the young brains of HK, unfortunately.

ori_b•1h ago

Steal? You mean at gunpoint? Or did these people want to leave of their own free will, and take a chance they were given?

jyscao•1h ago

Because “international law” is a farce, recent U.S. actions against Venezuela is but the latest example of that fact.

The strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must.

Yizahi•1h ago

The dissonance between this comment and the one above is striking really :) . One user asks for non-China countries to intervene in China or the occupied territories, and another user is outraged that the same has actually happened in Venezuela, despite that the only person to suffer had been one of the top-10 worst alive humans in the world (per millions humans harmed directly).

Pray tell me, how exactly do you see international law intervening in Chinese crimes, so that it won't look like ops in Venezuela (at minimum)? Issuing a strongly worded letter and Xi would comply?

SpicyLemonZest•1h ago

You're misunderstanding the analogy. The US's operation in Venezuela was itself a violation of international law, which the international community widely condemned and many countries wish they could have stopped. But there's no button they can push to make the US return Maduro, just as there's no button anyone can push to make China free Jimmy Lai. The only options are a variety of escalatory steps which implicate the relationship between one's own country and China as a whole.

nradov•52m ago

Which ratified treaty did the US's operation in Venezuela violate?

somenameforme•49m ago

The UN Charter is a rather unambiguous one.

SpicyLemonZest•44m ago

The US agreed in Article 2 of the UN Charter, which they ratified on July 1945, that they would refrain from the use of force against the political independence of any state.

The reason you've never seen anyone cite this is that it's pointless to cite, because the US foreign policy establishment does not care and will not be swayed by persuasive arguments about their treaty obligations.

junaru•36m ago

> operation

Putin has one too.

dragonwriter•29m ago

> Which ratified treaty did the US's operation in Venezuela violate?

Even if it hadn't violated a ratified treaty (it did violate several, starting with the UN Charter and OAS Charter), it would still violate international law; the US has recognized (among other places, in the London Charter of 1945 establishing the International Military Tribunal) that the crime of aggressive war exists independently of the crime of waging war in violation of international treaties.

FpUser•35m ago

>"despite that the only person to suffer "

Actually they killed whole bunch of people. And according to POTUS they're currently running the country so cut the bullshit please.

Yizahi•25m ago

Who "they"? If you want to say that this operation was completely botched and there was no quality improvement for the regular Venezuela citizens, then yes, i would agree completely. and international law also suffered as a result. At the same time it is also true that Maduro deserved to be smuggled out, tried and shot. By any possible law or moral standard of any country in the world. He is a horrible criminal even by known public facts. So these things are true at the same time. Same with China, if anyone would decide to intervene there, it would be good and bad simultaneously. There is no easy clear answer to that.

coldtea•30m ago

>the only person to suffer had been one of the top-10 worst alive humans in the world

That's just what they told you to justify taking their oil

onlypassingthru•29m ago

Pro tip: Try to get the facts straight before commenting.

"There was a lot of death on the other side, unfortunately. But a lot of Cubans were killed yesterday trying to protect him," Trump said.[0]

[0]https://www.cbsnews.com/news/u-s-officials-reveal-new-detail...

Yizahi•20m ago

That's true. But the point still stands. People are outraged even for a small number of cartel criminals shot. Imagine what would happen if someone would try to liberate oppressed people in China. The count would be in millions.

ecshafer•1h ago

How many people should've died for Hong Kong? Should we have invaded China? Should we have drafted millions of men from across the west and put boots on the ground?

2OEH8eoCRo0•1h ago

There are more options than nothing or war.

grunder_advice•1h ago

It's not like relations between China and the West aren't already as hostile as the West can tolerate.

Galanwe•1h ago

Where are you from?

The US shifted from "China is an economic power we should worry about" to "China is a military power we should worry about", but to me it seems to be a recent mind shift serving the current administration narrative.

As a European, I don't think there is much hostility against China here. Sure, people don't like the overall humanitarian situation with Uyghurs; and there are the usual issues with lobbying, intelligence, and currency manipulation, but overall the general public sentiment is rather neutral I would say.

dingnuts•1h ago

It is amazing in fact how willingly Europe seems to be running into the arms of the actual fascist dictator, Xi, at the first sign of turmoil in the US. The US is written off as a lost cause and you cozy up with a government that is everything you dislike about the current US administration but on steroids. All because the US wants the EU to pay for its own war.

youll get cheaper EVs though I guess

nradov•36m ago

Not at all. Perhaps you weren't paying attention but the narrative around relations with China started shifting during the Obama administration circa 2011. The bipartisan national security establishment is now broadly aligned with treating China as an adversary and strategic competitor.

FpUser•28m ago

>"China as an adversary and strategic competitor."

Nut sure about adversary. As for strategic competitor - this is normal state of affairs. Countries do compete and it is healthy

nradov•17m ago

Be sure. The US national security establishment absolutely considers China to be an adversary. Look for terms like "pacing threat" when they discuss military acquisition programs.

This is an existential issue. Health has nothing to do with it.

FpUser•7m ago

>"The US national security establishment absolutely considers China to be an adversary"

I think any country that does not agree that the US should rule the world and is able to challenge it is considered an adversary.

philwelch•1h ago

Just out of curiosity, what country manufactured the device you typed that comment on? There’s a lot of room for relations to get more hostile.

phr4ts•1h ago

> It's not like relations between China and the West aren't already as hostile as the West can tolerate.

It's just the US that's publicly wary of china, heck, it's just Trump

FridayoLeary•55m ago

Nonsense. They can and should push back much more. If Europe were to show a united front there's little China could do to punish them. Their only option would be to cosy up to America/Trump, which is a realistic possibility, but it's something they would be very uncomfortable with.

catlikesshrimp•1h ago

It is uncertain if there are more options for Taiwan. Hong Kong was a lost cause since the British withdrew

yanhangyhy•1h ago

its certain, i ensure you. taiwan wont get the treat like Hong Kong before. Hong Kong proves the one country two system policy is a failure. the only result is war and taiwan will lose

stickfigure•1h ago

> taiwan will lose

That depends on how cowardly the rest of the world acts if/when the time comes.

yanhangyhy•1h ago

looks at Ukraine, its white people and NATO wont fight for it. how about another group of chinse vs chinese in far far away? and the global south supports china more?

nradov•27m ago

That's a total non sequitur. Ukraine wasn't a NATO member so why would NATO fight for it? (Several NATO members have given substantial aid to Ukraine.) In terms of a potential conflict between mainland China and Taiwan, the only NATO member with the capacity to do anything is the USA. The other players will be Japan, South Korea, Vietnam, and Australia so the outcome will largely depend on whether they decide to get involved.

yanhangyhy•22m ago

> Ukraine wasn't a NATO member so why would NATO fight for it?

so is taiwan.

> The other players will be Japan, South Korea, Vietnam, and Australia so the

i can ensure you Vietnam and SK wont. and we want Japan to join so much. Aus is like a bonus maybe

Galanwe•1h ago

> That depends on how cowardly the rest of the world acts if/when the time comes.

Or how weary of not having access to TSMC the rest of the world is.

komali2•55m ago

The PRC will happily sell chips to the West. I live in Taiwan, I don't want it to happen, but people need to stop acting like countries will prevent an invasion because it means the CPC will control chip manufacturing.

The choice is between possible nuclear war, or, the 5090s are more expensive and sometimes Americans can't buy them when the PRC is punishing the west for something.

lossolo•29m ago

Honestly, this is the most reasonable comment here, especially coming from someone in Taiwan. I hear similar views when I'm in Asia, which are very different from what I hear back in the West.

yanhangyhy•24m ago

i miss the old times when we think most taiwan people are kind and nice and we want do it peacefully. sadly as more as we know, we want war more. i hope ccp starts the war sooner, even though many of my stocks will drop because of it.

nradov•11m ago

It's weirdly myopic how HN users always think of TSMC as the main factor here. In reality the greater concern has always been containing China within the first island chain. As long as mainland China doesn't control Taiwan they have no way to secure their sea lines of communication.

skinnymuch•56m ago

This thread casually talks about Taiwan being a vassal state of the US during a civil war and Hong Kong being a colony of the British. Yet the world, largely the global south, should intervene and help the global north to exploit the rest of the world more?

Every one gets that far away countries across the world can’t put military bases right next to Europe or the US. However when it comes to China, that is not only acceptable but it’s the anti-cowardly move to support outsider aggressors.

komali2•53m ago

> can’t put military bases right next to Europe or the US

Indeed, Japan and Korea and the Philippines have American military bases on them.

You mentioned Taiwan, curious why? It has no American military bases. Perhaps of all the countries in the region, it's the most sovereign in that sense.

skinnymuch•40m ago

Interesting. I didn’t know there were no US military bases there. Still Taiwan exists as it does because of the US meddling across the world.

komali2•37m ago

This doesn't make any sense, the USA hasn't touched anything about Taiwan in any meaningful way ever since it became the ROC, and certainly not at all since the KMT was overthrown. In fact American overtures to control chip manufacturing here were rejected explicitly as "economic imperialism."

What's with this Americentric geopolitical analysis?

yanhangyhy•30m ago

taiwan only exist because USA navy intervene in the war

zelphirkalt•40m ago

Not really. The world got other problems. Europe is out for now, since we got Fascists at our doorstep trying to conquer Ukraine. The US has the orange clown as president, who is cozy with Putin. I don't think you can ascribe it to others being cowards, if "the world" doesn't react to protect Taiwan. It is right at China's doorstep. The logistic imbalance of trying to protect Taiwan, being this close to China is insane.

In the end, if a war happens, it will be idiotic again, from an economical point of view and from a humanitarian point of view. Economically, of course it will cost huge amount of resources to conquer Taiwan, and it will only disturb trade and what is already established on Taiwan. From a humanitarian point of view, of course many people will die.

The smartest China could do, would be to return to a soft power approach, and continue to develop mainland China, to continue to rival and even surpass Taiwan/Taipei. There are many young people, who don't have the walls in their minds, that the older population has. They don't want war, they want their freedom, and they want a high living standard. All this would be theoretically possible, if China didn't let ideology rule, but instead went for the economically best route, which is most certainly not an invasion.

nradov•22m ago

China's takeover of Hong Kong proved that any notion of "one country, two systems" is a total lie and assurances from the Chinese Communist Party are completely worthless. There's no coming back from that, at least as long as Xi Jinping remains in power. Young people in Taiwan are less supportive of reintegration with the mainland than ever before. Fewer of them even have direct family ties there now.

zelphirkalt•10m ago

> Young people in Taiwan are less supportive of reintegration with the mainland than ever before.

Well, go figure, if you run military "exercises" at the doorstep of your neighbor, people are not gonna like you very much, duh. But there was a time before more recent escalations, when lots of young Taiwanese people did not think too badly about being part of China. That's why I said that the smartest move would be (or would have been) to continue an approach of soft power and development, to rival life in Taiwan. Give the people comfort and high living standard, and they are less likely to dislike you.

somenameforme•27m ago

I don't think this is realistic. A few thoughts in no particular order:

- War is logistics and you're talking about trying to get involved in a war, that would necessitate supply lines thousands of miles long, between two countries that are separated by 80 miles.

- China is extremely technologically advanced with the largest military in the world, by a wide margin.

- China is the at-scale manufacturing king of the world. In a shift to a war economy, nobody would be able to come even remotely close to competing. They parallel the US in WW2 in a number of ways.

- China is a nuclear power, meaning getting involved is going to be Ukraine style indirect aid to try to avoid direct conflict and nuclear escalation.

- Any attempt to engage in things like sanctions would likely hurt the sanctioners significantly more than China.

- The "rest of the world" you're referring to is the anglosphere, EU, and a few oddballs like Japan or South Korea. This makes up less than 15% of the world, and declining.

- War fatigue is real. The US really wanted to invade Syria, but no matter how hard we beat the war drums, people just weren't down with it. I think this is because people saw major echoes of Iraq at the time, and Taiwan will have a far louder echo of Ukraine. This isn't a show many people will be enthusiastic about rerunning.

SideburnsOfDoom•13m ago

> supply lines thousands of miles long, between two countries that are separated by 80 miles

I think this one is particularly important. IIRC, it's usually phrased something like "if the USA sends aircraft carriers across the pacific, then China has an unsinkable aircraft carrier 80 miles away: the mainland".

FpUser•23m ago

You really believe that "the rest of the world" countries should conscript citizens and go to war to help Taiwan? Most people if faced with this choice would direct you to the place where the sun does not shine.

thomassmith65•1h ago

In 1997, China had nowhere near the leverage it has today.

mothballed•1h ago

Chinese Muslim Uyghurs who were preparing to fight for their people in China started consolidating a home base in Syria where they collected arms and a militia.

They are finally off the terrorist list a few years ago, but for a long time the US policy was to feign outrage but then declare anyone using any teeth to push back against China as a terrorist.

kdheiwns•1h ago

I mean, they were blowing up buses of civilians in China. Then looking up those Brave Uyghur Peace fighters, Wikipedia says they had child soldiers and they were allied with various Islamic state groups (the white text on black flag types, of which they also had their own) and wanted to impose strict sharia law.

I'm pretty confident that most women in Xinjiang are pretty happy that that group was smeared out. You can think Xinjiang and Uyghurs shouldn't be oppressed without supporting actual, unironic terrorist groups who want total theocratic control and full on jihad. I'm more amazed they're removed from the terrorist list. Seems like a weird political decision.

thenthenthen•1h ago

The Mujahideen fighting in Afghanistan against USSR in the 70’s were co-trained by China and the CIA. Guess where in China.

mothballed•7m ago

Presume all you've said is true, which, for various factious or groups of Uyghurs likely was true.

That still doesn't establish it as the distinguishing factor as to why the US declared them as terrorist. I fought in the YPG in the Syrian Civil War, an ally of the USA. Guess what, there were those who looked 13,14,15 usually because the Syrian government or ISIS had incapacitated their parents somehow. Mostly they were way back as token guards at training outposts but I also saw some near the front. The YPG also had to ally with a bunch of nasty arab militias to survive, in fact, that's why the SDF/YPG just got largely wiped out because the consolidation of the rebels in Damascus resulted in their arab allies turning their back. (In fact, Wikipedia page says IS is opponent of Uyghur militia).

As sister poster alludes, the US has never had an issue allying with "terrorists" when it suits their goals. Especially when fighting against USSR.

So knowing that this isn't the distinguishing factor, can you point to any other armed group in China that has credible potential for an armed uprising that hasn't been declared a terrorist? There might be one, I just don't know who they are, but I am very interested to read about them.

To me it looks like the difference is that they were a credible threat of violence against China, not that they have slaughtered innocent people which the USA has done as have many of their allies.

AlotOfReading•42m ago

If we measure the cost of freedom, that simply becomes the level of violence a would-be oppressor needs to promise in order to deny it. There isn't an easy or universal answer here and I'd argue there can't be. To give two historical examples, many Americans raised similar objections against entering WW2 to fight the axis. Some of those same people also opposed the US Japanese concentration camps, for the same reasons.

You might disagree on whether HKers' freedoms are truly being abridged or whether you care, but the questions you posed weren't complete enough on their own.

pphysch•1h ago

It's wild to see these comments from the same accounts that within the same 24-hours are (justifiably) hand-wringing over the corrupt and illegal actions of the US government, related to ICE, Epstein, etc.

The US government lies and does a lot of bad stuff, but we must believe everything they say about big bad chyna, the one entity big enough to hold the USG accountable.

komali2•1h ago

This earth has plenty of room for more than one country doing bad stuff.

SpicyLemonZest•54m ago

The source article is from a British outlet, what does the US government have to do with it?

hn_throwaway_99•1h ago

Welcome to the real world. The UK is obviously in no position to challenge China. And with the US invading and threatening to take over other sovereign nations solely because "it's in our national interest", we're certainly not one to talk.

sampton•1h ago

Sad that international community doesn't do more to intervene in US. Seriously, please help.

munk-a•1h ago

If any external force tried to "fix" the US it would result in stubborn revanchism and a deeper slide into corruption. To grossly generalize - the American culture of self-reliance means that any imposition of order, even if positive, would be rejected by most of the population (which is somewhat fair, since external impositions do compromise sovereignty).

If a good outcome is to happen - it needs to be driven and supported domestically.

hnfong•48m ago

Congratulations on figuring out why foreign intervention does not work in general!

diamondfist25•1h ago

“Pls help”

Trump takes out manduro

“He’s hitler”

The woke mob has never been so confused

hackyhacky•56m ago

What has "taking out" Maduro accomplished, other than allowing American oil companies to profit? Venezuela is ruled by the same party, the situation for the Venezuelan people has not changed.

> The woke mob has never been so confused

I'm confused what you mean by "woke" here. Is opposing violation of international law "woke"?

wiseowise•48m ago

How come Trump doesn’t help Ukraine?

FatherOfCurses•35m ago

Only if you take a sixth-grader's view of geopolitics.

People can say that the Western world should do more to promote democracy in China (or not financially enable China to suppress its people) while at the same time saying that invading a country and kidnapping its leader is not the way to solve a similar problem.

takklob•28m ago

> Only if you take a sixth-grader's view of geopolitics.

The problem of democracy indeed. Many of these people now yearn to be peasants too. A simpler life for a simpler mind. Perhaps they should be given what they want.

diamondfist25•1h ago

Because ccp has spread woke mind virus to the west. Like u see here in hackernews, ppl with TDS and MDS and yet proclaims to fight for freedom

hackyhacky•52m ago

You use these words like "woke" "TDS" "MDS" "mind virus", not because you want to contribute to the conversation, but because you want to justify your inattention to the conversation.

These words are thought-terminating cliches. Relevant link for HN today: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thought-terminating_clich%C3%A...

FatherOfCurses•41m ago

Yeah the first thing I think of when I hear the word "woke" is the CCP.

Exoristos•16m ago

One does not (normally) use weapons of war against one's own population.

zelphirkalt•51m ago

Are you saying the rest of the world should have stood up for what ultimately is colonialism? And colonialism of the British out of all the people? And also in a territory, that is directly on or neighboring the Chinese landmass? The Chinese people have a long history of others trying to conquer them or colonize them. They are probably pretty allergic to such notions, and will reject them. Realistically speaking, no one would have had the resources to force HK staying the same enclave it has been. This all sounds rather unrealistic.

We can agree on the treatment of HK being far from ideal, and I would go as far as saying, that even economically for China itself, it was not good to handle the matter as they did. That is where their ideology shows. HK was an economical hub. In recent times though many businesses left and more are unwilling to invest. This is the economical downside, that could simply have been avoided by not doing what they did. The question should be asked "Why not just leave it as it is, since it is working well, economically?" But they had to mess with it. Another downside is international reputation damage of course. China has achieved many great things in the past decades and now has cities more modern and convenient than most of what you find in Europe. Their one problem remains ideology. That they sometimes feel the need to do things, that are not economically sound, for the sake of ideology.

However, I can't agree with anyone arguing, that HK should not be part of China, like some people do in the comments here. It's a separate matter from policies implemented. Of course I wish for HKers to keep their freedoms. Who doesn't. Of course I wish China would not implement policies, that endanger the freedom of its people. But territorial? Nope, HK always was bound to become a part of China.

What I can say more from visiting HK twice is, that they still got Internet (uncensored), in contrast to other parts of China. Every week I am speaking with someone from HK, using Signal, which is not practical for anyone from (most?) other parts of China. When traveling in China, I used a HK eSIM, to have reliable and uncensored Internet. I hope that these aspects still remain intact for a long time, or that the rest of China will open up. At some point they should have the confidence in their own economy to compete on global scale.

StopDisinfo910•42m ago

Last time, I checked Hong-Kong didn't become a free city but part of another country. So they have traded a master for another one.

I am genuinely lost in your argument. You start against colonialism then justify Hong-Kong being reintegrated to China because they would have taken it by force anyway which is pretty much the same thing as colonialism.

You then pivot to arguing HK was always going to be part of China for a reason I find unclear. Hong-Kong was never part of the PRC before the handover so I don't really see the appeal to continuity.

Have you considered that people are not arguing for colonialism but actually against any form of coercitive control?

zelphirkalt•14m ago

Why are you lost in the argument? The point I am making is, that it would be great to have both. HK as part of China, no longer a UK colony, but also having freedoms remain intact. Shouldn't be too hard to grasp. Furthermore, I am saying, that economically how HK has been handled does not make much sense, and that ideology was at play.

Giving back HK might have been the only sensible move back then, and it might have bought HKers time and avoided a more open conflict, that wouldn't have ended well for HK.

At least Wikipedia disagrees with your sentiment, that HK was never part of China. Well, technically you said "PRC", maybe even intentionally, and you could take some weird position of claiming, that nothing inside China is part of China, because it was a different entity before PRC. But then so do many countries all over the world lose any claim to their territory. Germany, after second world war, France after French revolution, most prominently the US, after its founding ... Historically, HK was a grab of land by the UK. Granted, they built something nice up there, but only after the despicable acts they committed historically in the region. If we get into what the UK did historically in the region, it will not lead to a moral high ground.

morsecodist•38m ago

> HK always was bound to become a part of China

Why so? Do you think Monaco should be part of France? Do you think Singapore should be part of Malaysia? A lot of big countries respect the sovereignty of neighboring smaller countries, although that is unfortunately becoming less true now.

It isn't about colonialism. I have never seen anyone seriously argue it should go back to the British. It is about a framework to ensure they maintain their rights. It would be great if that looked like expanded rights for all of China but it can also look like some degree of sovereignty, which was in place for quite some time.

Bayart•23m ago

> Do you think Monaco should be part of France?

Monaco is already 90% part of France. There was an agreement until recently that Monaco would become French if the Princeship went extinct. By law the Prime Minister and the Police has to be French. France also handles their defense etc. It's very conditional sovereignty, the deal being that they can be a tax heaven if they want to, but not to France and Italy.

> Do you think Singapore should be part of Malaysia?

AFAIK they've been expelled from Malaysia after independence.

I'm not trying to disprove your point, just that it's fluid and fragile. Sovereignty itself has only been conceptually defined with the Treaties of Westphalia, it's recent and quintessentially Western.

zelphirkalt•8m ago

> It isn't about colonialism. I have never seen anyone seriously argue it should go back to the British.

Then you should read more of the comments here, and you will have that completely new experience.

jimmydoe•38m ago

Given what US companies did to ICC, it’s not hard to imagine, if UN intervine, their officials’ Chinese EV will be taking over remotely and driven off the bridge.

UK “taking back” HK is also very imaginative , like white people dreaming of recolonizing Asia in 21st century? Good luck.

dzonga•12m ago

> UK and the rest of the world should have demanded its return

Demand its return based on what principles ? How did the UK gain control of Hong Kong

Would the UK be able to go to war with China over HK ?

in the words of Dave Chappell - hello UN, if you got problems, bring ya army! oh you ain't no army

jorblumesea•1h ago

cruel and obviously politically motivated, meant to send a message to HK and anyone who publicly criticizes the CCP.

jajuuka•59m ago

Not surprising to see all the comments devolve into hyperbole. Nuance and thoughts on China in the west are just impossibilities.

StopDisinfo910•51m ago

There are plenty of nuance to be had on the situation in China but I wonder what you mean here.

Are you arguing that it's legitimate to put a 78 years old from a former democratic city forcefully reintegrated to another state in jail for 20 years because he is saying that the will of the people should be heard?

hnfong•46m ago

Nice strawman. Where's your nuance?

StopDisinfo910•26m ago

I would be happy for you to explain where exactly is the straw man and where you expect more nuance.

You think he wasn't condemned because he expressed pro-democracy view and this is not a speech issue?

I would like to read it rather than vague call for nuance.

jajuuka•23m ago

https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/law-and-crime/article/33...

skinnymuch•45m ago

Forcefully reintegrated? Colonialism was the forceful part. Not a country having control of its own land.

He isn’t demanding any will of the people. Unlike the EU, US, etc, Chinese people are actually happy with their democratic China. In no way in Europe or US can a city claim they want “democratic” independence and go completely against the rest of the country on the side of recent protests and meddling by outside state depts. They would correctly be viewed as traitors and agitators.

Yizahi•31m ago

There is nothing democratic about China. This is just a fact. Admittedly western countries are also not democratic per definition, but at least they have an elected oligarchy, which is miles closer to democracy than Chinese despotic regime. Even if the regime in China is kinda benevolent to the subjects, it doesn't matter for this question. Democracy is a word used a for a very specific thing, and it's completely absent in China.

jajuuka•25m ago

So all the elections that happen in China are not democratic?

CrossVR•29m ago

Europe actually has quite a few independent cities with their own little micro nations that are democratically independent.

StopDisinfo910•28m ago

The PRC never owned Hong-Kong before the handover and I don't remember the population of Hong-Kong voting for reintegration so yes, forcefully reintegrated seems like a nice way to frame it. Actually taken over would be more correct, traded as merchandise would also be appropriate I guess. You get the idea.

hnfong•16m ago

Much of Hong Kong was under a 99 year lease. Which is why the Brits had to hand it back in 1997 when the lease expired.

Sure, it was a lease from the Qing dynasty which doesn't exist any more, but still.

jajuuka•42m ago

That's not why he and his company was convicted with multiple counts of sedition. This is what I am talking about. It's a rewriting of reality to fit a neat black and white narrative to suit whatever agenda you want.

skinnymuch•51m ago

The smugness and superiority about how the rest of the world are immoral barbarians and the global status quo of white/western hegemony is amazing and very moral is pretty funny. It’s pretty obvious these same people in the past would’ve said the US’s chattel slavery is not that bad because other countries do slavery too. The equivocations westerners will do.

EB-Barrington•52m ago

China is repressive, autocratic, dictatorial, illiberal, unaccountable, coercive, censorious, surveillance-heavy, propagandistic, corrupt, brutal, heavy-handed, intolerant, secretive, and very very very militarised.

Just an FYI.

palmotea•47m ago

FYI, you're shadowbanned. Your comments by default show up as hidden for most users.

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Medieval Monks Wrote over Ancient Star Catalog – Particle Accel Reveals Original

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Roman industrial hub discovered on banks of River Wear

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Offpunk 3.0

Irish man detained by ICE for 5 months

GitHub Is Down

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Hong Kong pro-democracy tycoon Jimmy Lai gets 20 years' jail

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Converting a $3.88 analog clock from Walmart into a ESP8266-based Wi-Fi clock

Sleeper Shells: Attackers Are Planting Dormant Backdoors in Ivanti EPMM

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Hard-braking events as indicators of road segment crash risk

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UEFI Bindings for JavaScript

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It's not you; GitHub is down again

The Traffic Mimes of Bogotá

Medieval Monks Wrote over Ancient Star Catalog – Particle Accel Reveals Original

Long-Sought Proof Tames Some of Math's Unruliest Equations

AT&T, Verizon blocking release of Salt Typhoon security assessment reports

Art of Roads in Games

Like Game-of-Life, but on Growing Graphs, with WASM and WebGL

Vouch

Humans peak in midlife: A combined cognitive and personality trait perspective

Why is Singapore no longer "cool"?

Nobody knows how the whole system works

Roman industrial hub discovered on banks of River Wear

Show HN: Printable Classics – Free printable classic books for hobby bookbinders

Show HN: Browse Internet Infrastructure

Offpunk 3.0

Irish man detained by ICE for 5 months

GitHub Is Down

Matrix messaging gaining ground in government IT

LispE: Lisp Interpreter with Pattern Programming and Lazy Evaluation

Every book recommended on the Odd Lots Discord

Show HN: A custom font that displays Cistercian numerals using ligatures

Experts Have World Models. LLMs Have Word Models

Show HN: Minimal NIST/OWASP-compliant auth implementation for Cloudflare Workers