Beijing’s swift action to tighten its grip on the once-freewheeling financial centre of Hong Kong has handed Australia yet another problem in its increasingly fractured relationship with the People’s Republic of China.
To make matters worse, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo wants to remove Hong Kong’s special status for trade and investment.
The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region that Xi Jinping appears determined to make not-quite-so-special is home to about 100,000 Australians as well as about 6000 Australian-owned businesses, according to the latest figures from the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.
While there are a handful of Australian corporations in the city — led by financial services group Macquarie, which has its Asia headquarters high up in Hong Kong’s gleaming International Financial Centre — most Australian businesses in Hong Kong are small to medium enterprises.
In turn, the majority of these are trade and service businesses run by expatriate Hongkongers who have gained Australian citizenship.
Indeed, the face of Australian business in Hong Kong has become increasingly Chinese in recent decades.
A quick glance at the Platinum Partners of the Australian Chamber of Commerce — companies that pony up more cash each year to be front and centre of the group’s activities — tells the tale.
Along with Macquarie are ANZ and the Commonwealth Bank — which has a major research and development hub in the city — Telstra and former Australia construction group Leighton (now Dutch owned) as well as a laundry-list of large Hong Kong companies, including Li Ka-Shing’s CK Infrastructure, CLP Holdings Limited, Chow Tai Fook Holdings and Asia Miles.
None of this obviates the real problem for Australians, and probably more particularly Australian businesses as Beijing makes official its new status: that new laws curbing any kind of dissent suddenly make Hong Kong as risky as the mainland where the law can be applied capriciously.
To underscore these fears, business groups and diplomats as well as human rights groups have spoken out against the new laws. It may be the last time they can.
Beijing and the compliant Hong Kong government are striving to reassure business that nothing will change; the unspoken pact is more control and more certainty for business in the shape of no more disruption on the streets.
But Beijing has form in quickly taking the next step, and the logical conclusion is a deteriorating of the Hong Kong legal system that underpins the business environment.
The latest stoush between the Xi Jinping administration and the latest and least diplomatically savvy iteration of the Coalition government happens to come after last year’s ignominious signing of a so-called “free trade” agreement between Australia and Hong Kong.
This was not worth the paper it was written on at the time because it was fairly clear that, a) Beijing’s embrace was tightening quickly; and, b) Chinese firms rampantly use Hong Kong as a conduit point for trade. It’s impossible to separate what’s from China and what is from Hong Kong.
Trade and investment between Australia and Hong Kong is healthy. In 2018-19, Hong Kong was Australia’s 10th most important destination for merchandise exports at $8 billion, and seventh-largest services export market at $3 billion.
Hong Kong was the fifth largest source of total foreign investment, with a stock of $118.8 billion at the end of 2018. Hong Kong was also the 11th largest destination for Australian investment, with a stock of $52 billion at the end of 2018.
Now, the FTA looks even more like a fairly sad joke. Suddenly, too, the message from Canberra to Australian exporters could not be clearer: diversify, diversify — away from China.
And yes, that now quite explicitly means Hong Kong too, especially with the US set to use Hong Kong as a pawn in its ongoing battle with China.
Meanwhile, as Australians in Hong Kong nervously watch events unfold, many are preparing for something that has for a few years now seemed inevitable — relocating or returning to Australia.
The new security laws have triggered talk of mass migration both for Hongkongers with foreign passports — the US, UK, Taiwan, Canada and Australia being the main destinations.
How will the Australian government handle such an influx, and will China use it to Beijing’s advantage?
In previous scares, the Hong Kong exodus went to Canada, Singapore and New Zealand etc rather than Australia. This was not because we are not as attractive as the others, but because the paperwork our entry requires delays their visas. That is something we could fix before the need arises.
Why not establish a “free trade area ” around the Kimberley area. Could achieve a number of objectives in one action.
Wasn’t that Balfour’s bright idea for Jews pre WWI, revivified prior to WWII.
Everytning old is new again?
As long as they don’t jump on boats they’ll be fine. Not sure if that includes cruise boats though. Just get on a plane and claim asylum on arrival like many thousands have done in recent years.
The legislation does rather firmly shut the door on Hong Kong secession from China. The laws might not be as bad as Sainsbury makes out, so long as prosecutions take place in Hong Kong and a reasonable chance of defence is possible, which would not be the case if prosecutions were held in China outside of Hong Kong. Hong Kong will lose its “special system” status twenty years or so from now anyway and dreams expressed at the time of the UK agreement with China that people in Hong Kong by then will hardly notice the change might well not be fulfilled. There might well be refugees and no doubt we will deal with the claims of refugees from Hong Kong better than we have dealt with such claims lately. Is Sainsbury suggssting that we should be just as hostile, because these refugees might be turned to China’s advantage? What does he mean by that? Whatever it is, given Sainsbury’s record, it probably casts a dark, “China is our enemy now” cloud over our relations with China, just when we need to distance ourselves from the US desire to see China’s growth disrupted so that the US can stay at the top.
Not aware of any talk of HK’s “secession” from China – not mixing it up with Formosa/Taiwan are you?
That’s next on the “to do” list.
More red/yellow peril hyperventilation and scaremongering from Sainsbury. A browser search quickly shows who else is hyperventilating along with him. The usual suspects: The Guardian, CNN, New York Times, BBC (naturally), 9NEWS, Washington Post etc.
Other coverage like SCMP (South China Morning Post) is more nuanced. Here for example is Yonden Lhatoo, the Chief News Editor at the Post, in a piece entitled “Is Hong Kong American or Chinese territory? Beijing’s new national security law seeks to set that straight.” In it he “blames blatant interference by the US for the state of affairs prompting Beijing’s new legislation to protect national security, even as he expresses concerns about its unknown implications for the city”:
https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3085790/hong-kong-american-or-chinese-territory-beijings-new-national
Even Sainsbury acknowledged as much where he says: “And yes, that now quite explicitly means Hong Kong too, especially with the US set to use Hong Kong as a pawn in its ongoing battle with China.”
A few more excerpts from the article:
“So Beijing has decided enough is enough and taken matters into its own hands to bulldoze ahead with a national security law tailor-made for Hong Kong, because the city is utterly incapable of fulfilling its constitutional duty to come up with the necessary legislation of its own, 23 years after its return to Chinese sovereignty.”
“Smelling blood in the water, certain Western media outlets are in a feeding frenzy of sensational reports and apocalyptic headlines chronicling the “end/death of Hong Kong”, reminiscent of their sanctimonious divinations about the demise of our city during the 1997 handover, which turned out to be greatly exaggerated.”
And finally:
“The details of the new law are still to be spelt out and we don’t know what protections will be built into it to prevent abuse. If you believe the likes of cabinet-level government adviser Arthur Li Kwok-cheung, “There is nothing for Hong Kong people to worry about … unless they are revolutionaries, terrorists or those colluding with foreign powers.”
Yes, and I’m sure the Chinese government will be exceptionally fair and even-handed in determining who’s classified as a revolutionary, terrorist or foreign collaborator.
Credulity on the scale of yours is a godsend to repressive regimes everywhere. Pick a crackdown/takeover anywhere, any time in history and you’ll find it was aided and abetted by dopes like you going “You know, there’s really nothing to worry about here, they’re going to be fair about this.”
Why don’t you ask the Uyghurs in Xinjiang how those ‘national security laws’ are working out for them? They might be a little hard to get hold of, of course – I don’t imagine you get too much mail in concentration camps.
In real life things are more complicated than they seem at first glance. You really should inform yourself before flying off the handle and getting abusive. Here is an UN Security Council assessment of the situation things about which you speak.
https://www.un.org/securitycouncil/sanctions/1267/aq_sanctions_list/summaries/entity/eastern-turkistan-islamic-movement
Yup, serious terrorism here. Over a dozen years a handful of Islamic terrorists (no numbers given) killed maybe a similar number of people in Xinjiang (again no numbers) so locking up a million Uighur Muslims and stripping them of their cultural identity and teaching them to worship the emperor is the only (or should I say final) solution.
But it didn’t say anything about the brains behind the whole shooting match, namely the CIA and Mossad. Al, maybe you could supply a few links to one of your mates in Russia about this.
Can’t help you. Sorry. Do your own research. Try a Russian-language browser search and see what comes up. I use English as that’s the language I’m most proficient in. A few key words in the browser then filter the list of links. Ignore everything from Anglo-American corporate media. You know, Guardian, BBC, CNN, MSNBC, NYtimes, WaPo, AOL etc. A lot of rubbish still in the second tier (Politico, Daily Beast), but sometimes with luck and refined browsing a link comes up to material that is genuinely insightful and informative. I then pass it on. Like the UN Security Council assessment. And others.
Hi again Al. Glad to see you’re happy with the standard of SCMP. Here’s an earlier article from
SCMP (31 December 2015) with a bit more additional info on ‘King Arthur’
https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/1896777/five-things-know-about-arthur-lis-appointment-hku-council
“A strong ally of Hong Kong’s chief executive and a confrontational style virtually guarantee that ‘King Arthur’ will be a polarizing leader”
Sounds like a top guy. Intelligent, highly educated, broadly experienced in a number of fields including medical and top administrative, loves his city and his homeland, and staunchly stands in opposition to those who would subvert them. And it’s no argument that there are 5th column elements in HK who with external support are working to subvert them. The sort of person needed to confront those elements head on. Tough situations call for tough people.
Al, seems you get really turned on by sadists. Do you have huge photos of Hitler and Stalin in your dacha? Are you into whips and leather as well?
Careful, you’re revealing your personal interests to other readers here. But I need to ask. Were you a bully when you were at school?
Nah, not me. But it looks like Putin is a real leather-man who loves hanging out with bikies.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-0mYKfv1bts
I wonder if he goes to the Blue Oyster.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tdbt-sx5MDc
You really are in love with the guy, aren’t you?
Not really, Al. As you can see from the above video and the one below:
https://news.sky.com/story/putin-on-the-ritz-russian-president-dances-at-foreign-ministers-wedding-11475929
Putin seems to be into both leather and dancing so I was wondering if he’s ever goes to the Blue Onion. Doesn’t bother me, I’m not a homophobe, but it does make me wonder if Putin’s homophobia is just a cover for his deepest instincts that he is trying to suppress.
OK. Weirdly obsessed with the person of VVP then.
This is old stuff. Fluff pieces. Light-weight fill-in between serious news items shown on NTV for as long as I’ve been watching it. And that’s since before VVP rode into town and began to clean the place up.
But let me draw your attention back to the subject here which is the anti-Beijing rioting in Hong Kong. CrossTalk on RT did a good show today on just this subject, in the context of the rioting in the US. The players, the geopolitical agendas. Called “Bullhorns: Revolt!”, it should be up on YouTube in a day or so. You can find the playlist here:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLPszygYHA9K3a4mGdkQSwXklDHLWrB8uz
A recommended watch. If you can pull yourself away from ogling VVP’s musculature of course.
Thanks for the recommendation. I’ll check it out. But didja see how Australia and Russia might end up in the G7? Didn’t I tell you we’re moving into the big league? It’s great if we can do it with Russia as equal partners, 2 great civilizations reaching out across the globe.
Of course, it’d be even better if Ukraine came in at the same time and Putin accepted Ukraine as another equal partner. Maybe the mouth can have a word with Vlad and get him to see reason and withdraw from Crimea and Donbas. If he could pull that one off then we’d really be flyin. Maybe a Nobel Peace prize for the Mouth?
You see? That’s what happens when you stand up to bullies. They start to respect you. Maybe we should send the Mouth to Beijing to tell Xi to lay off Honkers and accept Taiwan’s independence. This could be the start of a new era of peace. Climb aboard the peace train, Al.
Yeah, the G7, who knew. All we had to do is pull a trump, piss off the chinese, ruin our trade and hey presto, we’re in! Well maybe…
You’re jumping the gun and getting overexcited I think. The Oz/G7 issue is so far only a thought bubble floated by Trump during a call to VVP on 1 June 2020. You can read it here:
http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/63444
It’s short so I reproduce it in full:
“Telephone conversation with US President Donald Trump
Vladimir Putin had a telephone conversation with President of the United States of America Donald Trump at the initiative of the American side.
June 1, 2020 18:45
The presidents exchanged views on the coronavirus response measures taken by both countries. Vladimir Putin expressed appreciation for the supply of US ventilators to Russia.
The Russian President congratulated Donald Trump on the successful launch of the Crew Dragon manned spacecraft on May 30, which carried American astronauts to the International Space Station. A common attitude towards the development of mutually beneficial cooperation in the space sector was confirmed.
The presidents addressed world oil market developments in the context of implementing the OPEC+ agreement. It was stated that this multilateral agreement, reached with the active support of the presidents of Russia and the United States, would lead to a gradual restoration of oil demand and price stabilisation.
Mr Trump informed Mr Putin about his idea of holding a G7 summit with the possible invitation of the leaders of Russia, Australia, India and the Republic of Korea.
The importance of enhancing the Russian-American dialogue on strategic stability and confidence-building measures in the military sector was noted.
The presidents agreed to continue contacts at various levels.
The conversation was constructive, businesslike and substantive.”
It appears Trump is trying to make good on a campaign proposition that getting on with Russia “would be a good idea.” With the mess his country is in he has nothing to lose.
The rest of your comment is fantasy and wishful thinking. It does not correspond to reality.
Well Al, I still think Australia, with our recent dramatically increased status could be the circuit breaker here and resolve Putin’s headaches for him. But he has to first admit and apologize for his past errors such as shooting down the Malaysian Flight-17 (300 fatalities), invasion of Ukraine and Crimea and the Salisbury poisonings.
Once he does that, we’ll be able give him advice on how to clean up the Covid mess he’s got himself into. Are you with me?
No, I’m not. Your comments here are a bizarre mix of delusion, fantasy and wishful thinking. They do not correspond to reality. But I see that your private obsession with VVP goes on and on. Why don’t you send him a nice email and tell him what he’s doing wrong. He may send you an autographed portrait of himself. Now wouldn’t that give you a thrill.