HK WARNS US: AXING SPECIAL STATUS ‘A DOUBLE-EDGED SWORD’

Hong Kong’s bitterly criticized government has told the US to keep out of the internal debate over new national security laws being imposed by China, and warned that withdrawal of the financial hub’s special status under US law could backfire on the US economy.

US President Donald Trump is due to announce later on Friday his response to the Chinese parliament’s advancement of security legislation for Hong Kong, which many lawyers, diplomats and investors fear could erode the city’s freedoms, which had been guaranteed for 50 years following the handover in 1997, Sarah Wu and Marius Zaharia wrote for Reuters on May 29, 2020.

The former British colony has been wracked by civil unrest amid fears Beijing is curbing the high degree of autonomy it has enjoyed under a “one country, two systems” formula put in place when it returned to Chinese rule in 1997. Beijing says the new legislation - likely to take effect before September after China’s parliament this week approved a decision to advance it - will tackle secession, subversion, terrorism and foreign interference in the city. It could see Chinese intelligence agencies set up bases in Hong Kong.

“Any sanctions are a double-edged sword that will not only harm the interests of Hong Kong but also significantly those of the US,” Hong Kong’s government said late on Thursday. It added that from 2009 to 2018, the US trade surplus of $297 billion with Hong Kong was the biggest among all Washington’s trading partners, and 1,300 US firms are based in the city.