1/ It is foreseeable that China will fully implement the national security law swiftly. 1.1/ It's based largely on the level of international pressure. Even though various countries have expressed concerns, unfortunately only a handful of them pledges to take punitive actions.
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2/ There is something the international community can do to stop China. 2.1/ Since China is a realist power with little faith in liberal values and rule-based systems, concrete actions are the one reason for China to reconsider its costs of suppression.
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2.2/ In order to stop China's reckless move, the world needs to have a robust mechanism against China's human rights misconducts, including human rights clauses in trade agreements with China, embargo related to sensitive items like dual-use goods and technology.
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2.3/ After all, with HK as the last beacon of liberty on China's soil, lots of mainland human rights defenders count on this city as their last resort for supporting their human rights works. When Beijing imposes a sweeping law in HK, it will kill civil society in both places.
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3/ China would try to arrest and take activists to the mainland once the laws are in place. 3.1/ With the same national security law, China has already killed the civil society in the Mainland, with journalists, activists, religious groups, publishers, liberal thinkers...
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3.2/ ...human rights lawyers, bloggers or even ex-pats thrown into prisons. Nobel Peace Prize laureate Liu Xiaobo was even imprisoned until his death. For a long period of time, Beijing has viewed the autonomous movements organized by protesters, as threats to its security.
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3.3/ When China now takes an unprecedented move to impose an unpopular law, it's evident that our freedom is on the brink of collapse. Beijing will claim to narrow its attack target at "a small group of people."...
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3.4/ ...However, once the law is put in place, there is no check & balance on how China uses the law, let alone any abuses of power. In the face of this imminent threat, HKers and I will strive by all means to safeguard our vanishing liberty. We hope the world can stand with us.
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4/ For the future of protest, police forces have unreasonably banned all forms of public gatherings. 4.1/ Even for the Tienanmen Square candlelight vigil, this year is the first time that the vigil was banned 31 years after the Massacre.
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4.2/ However, even so, people just defied the ban, broke through barricades and held our vigil. I am sure that repressive laws and barricades can't stop our spirit of resistance. We will fight for a majority of seats in Sep election in Sep to block other tyrannical legislations.
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4.3/ Just like democratization movements in other places, like South Korea, Taiwan, the Czech Republic and Poland, all fights for liberty and democracy take years. Now is still the beginning of our fight.
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4.4/ No matter how gloomy our future might be, I still hold strong confidence in Hongkongers. Therefore, I call upon the world to take actions to safeguard the city's freedoms from tyranny.
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End of conversation
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