HONG KONG

HONG KONG—Thousands of protesters, unbowed by a sweeping new national-security law imposed by China, staged the largest show of defiance in Hong Kong this year, with some risking heavy prison terms to chant slogans of liberation and demand independence.

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The United States has something called freedom of speech. Our freedom of speech is sacred. It's the most important thing in our Bill of Rights.

China has zero freedom of speech. They have an army of assholes who wipe stuff off the internet. And the dictatorship thinks this is normal.

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Here is the entire Wall Street Journal article:

WORLD

ASIA

CHINA

Hong Kong Police Quickly Enforce China’s Security Law as Thousands Protest

Authorities move to stifle dissent as city sees biggest demonstration in months.

By Dan Strumpf, Mike Bird and Joyu Wang

July 1, 2020

HONG KONG—Thousands of protesters, unbowed by a sweeping new national-security law imposed by China, staged the largest show of defiance in Hong Kong this year, with some risking heavy prison terms to chant slogans of liberation and demand independence.

Hundreds of Hong Kong police officers moved in swiftly to quash dissent and implement the law, which gives Beijing much greater powers to police the city and punish those accused of subversion and supporting separatism. Police fired tear gas, pepper spray and water cannons to disperse protesters and raised a banner to warn them that they could be violating the new law.

At the end of the day—the anniversary of Hong Kong’s 1997 handover from British colonial rule—the protests had dissipated, and police had arrested about 370 people, including 10 under the new law, which one senior Chinese official described Wednesday as a birthday present to the city.

The protests highlight the difficulty Beijing faces in suppressing dissent in a city that has become a global financial hub built on rule of law and Western-style freedoms. The new security law, which carries penalties of up to life imprisonment, risks further inflaming anti-Chinese sentiments in the city and triggering responses from Western governments that have criticized it as the greatest erosion of the city’s promised autonomy since the handover.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Wednesday called the law a “clear and serious breach” of an agreement with China to keep Hong Kong largely autonomous until 2047. He said the U.K. would retaliate with new rules making it easier for around three million eligible people from its former colony to emigrate to the U.K.

In the U.S., the House on Wednesday night passed by unanimous consent a bipartisan bill that would impose sanctions on Chinese officials who threaten Hong Kong’s limited autonomy, as well as the banks and firms that do business with them.

The Senate unanimously approved a similar bill, sponsored by Sens. Pat Toomey (R., Pa.) and Chris Van Hollen (D., Md.), last week.

In addition to mandatory sanctions, the bill includes a provision that gives Congress the ability to override a president’s decision to waive or terminate sanctions through a joint resolution of disapproval. Such a resolution would have to pass both the House and Senate by a veto-proof two-thirds majority.

“Today’s action is an urgently needed response to the cowardly Chinese government’s passage of its so-called ‘national security’ law, which threatens the end of the ‘one country, two systems’ promised exactly 23 years ago today,” said Speaker Nancy Pelosi, (D., Calif.) in a statement. “All freedom-loving people must condemn this horrific law, which is purpose-built to dismantle democratic freedoms in Hong Kong.”

Mrs. Pelosi urged President Trump to take strong action to hold Chinese officials accountable, including through the sanctions set out in the legislation passed on Wednesday.

“We must consider every tool at our disposal, including visa limitations and economic penalties, to keep alive the hopes for freedom, justice and real autonomy for the people of Hong Kong,” she said.

One 78-year-old woman among the protesters said she fled to Hong Kong in the 1970s to escape Communist Party suppression during China’s Cultural Revolution and was dismayed by Beijing extending its reach into the city.

“What we see today is this national security-law, which is much worse than what Mao Zedong did to us,” she said. “We are not scared anymore at this age. We want to oppose the national-security law.”

On Wednesday, several prominent members of Hong Kong’s pro-democracy movement testified before the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee about the implications of the new law. Their appearance could prove a test of the law’s prohibition on collusion with a foreign country to interfere in the city’s affairs.

“We will continue our past activities for justice and democracy and not be deterred by the new authoritarian law,” Lee Cheuk-yan, a former legislator and prominent opposition leader, told the committee via a video link from Hong Kong, according to prepared remarks he released.

Lawmakers in the U.S. Congress on Tuesday introduced a bipartisan bill to give refugee status to Hong Kong residents at risk of persecution under the new law.

Chinese and Hong Kong officials said the law was necessary to restore order and that it was within Beijing’s authority to impose it. China’s government has demonstrated enough political tolerance and recent unrest in the city has challenged its bottom line, Zhang Xiaoming, deputy director of the Chinese government’s Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office, told reporters in Beijing on Wednesday.

“As Deng Xiaoping said, people in Hong Kong can still criticize the Communist Party of China after the handover,” he said. “However, you cannot turn these into actions.”

Following Wednesday’s demonstrations, a spokesman for the Chinese military garrison stationed in Hong Kong issued a statement of support for the new legislation, saying “the garrison officers and soldiers will resolutely implement the government’s decision-making.”

Historically, civic groups have staged demonstrations in Hong Kong on the July 1 anniversary. More than half a million demonstrators took to the streets on the date last year to protest a since-withdrawn bill that would have allowed the extradition of suspects from Hong Kong to China.

Police rejected an application for a march this year, citing a ban on large gatherings because of the new coronavirus, as well as violence at past rallies. Activists said they would defy the ban and march anyway.

China rushed through the national-security legislation hours before July 1.

The number of protesters grew through the afternoon, paralyzing traffic in some areas as they filled roads. Some set up roadblocks. Crowds of people swarmed through the city to escape police dragnets.

Among those arrested was Andrew Wan, a Democratic Party lawmaker, according to his assistant.

“You can see Hong Kong people coming out speaking bravely,” said Ramon Yuen, a district councilor for the same party. “The law deprives the rights of Hong Kong people—media freedom, the freedom to protest.”

In the Causeway Bay shopping district, hundreds of demonstrators gathered in front of a police blockade chanting independence slogans. One woman, holding a handwritten sign calling for Hong Kong independence and decorated with U.S. and British flags, rushed to confront the police and was quickly arrested.

Hong Kong police later showed off the sign in a tweet announcing their second arrest for violating the national-security law. One officer was stabbed in the arm making an arrest, the force said.

In a sign of how wide-reaching the new law may be, police issued a statement that noted some protesters were chanting, “Hong Kong independence, the only way out.” The statement said such slogans are “suspected to be inciting or abetting others to commit secession” and may violate the new law.

Some Hong Kong residents were swept up in the action as police formed cordons around the Causeway Bay shopping district.

“I’m very angry,” said Ricky Po, who was walking through the area with his daughter at the time, as police officers moved to stop activists taking down a nearby banner that supported the new law. He said the law “removes human rights, I can’t have freedom of speech.”

By nightfall, police had swept through several districts, sealing off a shopping mall that had filled with protesters, and making numerous arrests inside. The protests ended around 10 p.m., police said.

—Wenxin Fan and Lindsay Wise
contributed to this article.

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Write to Dan Strumpf at daniel.strumpf@wsj.com, Mike Bird at Mike.Bird@wsj.com and Joyu Wang at joyu.wang@wsj.com