SinoInsight 1
On Nov. 4, Chinese leader Xi Jinping and Hong Kong chief executive Carrie Lam met on the sidelines of the second China International Import Expo in Shanghai. The unscheduled session was the first official meeting between the two since the anti-extradition bill protests broke out in Hong Kong in June.
According to a Xinhua report, Xi heard Lam’s report on the Hong Kong situation and noted that the “disturbances” in the city had lasted for five months. Xi said that Lam had led the Hong Kong government to “fully discharge its duties, strive to stabilize the situation and improve the social atmosphere, and has done a lot of hard work.”
Xi added that the central government has “high trust” in Lam and “fully affirms” the work of the chief executive and her government. “Curbing the violence and stopping the chaos in accordance with the law is still the most important task facing Hong Kong. ” he said. Xi concluded, “I hope that people from all walks of life in Hong Kong will comprehensively and accurately implement the ‘one country, two systems’ policy and the Basic Law and work together to safeguard Hong Kong’s prosperity and stability.”
The official report of the Xi-Lam meeting made no mention of the Hong Kong police or whether Xi Jinping approved of their actions—a glaring omission in considering that the People’s Daily said in late October that the police had the central government’s “unwavering support” while the Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office and the PRC foreign ministry had declared support for the Hong Kong police on several occasions.
Many observers believe that the Xi-Lam meeting shows that despite recent speculation about her job safety, Lam still has the backing of Beijing.
On Nov. 6, Carrie Lam and PRC vice premier Han Zheng met in Beijing at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse. Han repeated most of Xi’s observations about Hong Kong with one exception—he said that the central government “fully affirms” the work of Carrie Lam, her government, and the “dedicated work” of the Hong Kong police force. He added that the central government supports the Hong Kong government in “adopting more proactive and more effective measures to solve social problems” like unaffordable housing and employment for young people. The Han-Lam meeting appeared to have been scheduled at the last minute as the Hong Kong chief executive’s office only announced it on Nov. 3.
OUR TAKE
1. We have been warning about Carrie Lam’s job and personal security since August (see here, here, here). While Lam’s meeting with Xi greatly lowers her personal security risks, her job as chief executive is by no means secure. If anything, there is still a high chance that Lam will be replaced in the coming months.
Several signs suggest that Carrie Lam continues to face very high levels of political risk:
- Xi Jinping only formally met Lam five months into the anti-extradition bill protests. Also, the meeting was unscheduled and took place on the sidelines of a less prestigious event in the PRC’s calendar. If Xi wanted to show strong support for Lam, he could have scheduled an official meeting with her earlier at Zhongnanhai or on the sidelines of prominent events like the PRC’s 70th anniversary celebration. It is unclear if Xi or Hong Kong overseer Han Zheng held unofficial meetings with Lam while she was in Beijing during the Oct. 1 celebrations.
- In speaking with Lam in Shanghai, Xi said, “I hope that people from all walks of life in Hong Kong will comprehensively and accurately implement the ‘one country, two systems’ policy and the Basic Law.” Xi’s remark gives the central government a ready-made excuse to blame Lam for not “accurately implementing the ‘one country, two systems’ policy” if it decides to sacrifice Lam at some stage.
- Lam attended the 70th anniversary celebrations in Beijing, but was given the “cold shoulder” treatment by state media. When Lam appeared on CCTV’s coverage of the celebration parade on Tiananmen Square, it was in a long wide sweeping shot. In contrast, Sergeant Lau, a Hong Kong police officer whom PRC media lauded as a “hero” for pointing a gun directly at protesters and was invited to the 70th anniversary celebration, was given a close-up shot on CCTV.
- If Xi approved of the Hong Kong police’s actions, he would have said so in meeting Lam. The fact that he only “fully affirms” Lam and her government, but not the police, is a glaring omission.
- In October, both Western and Hong Kong newspapers widely reported that Beijing is planning to replace Lam with an “interim” chief executive, possibly by March 2020.
Abraham Shek Lai-him, a Hong Kong pro-establishment legislator, strongly criticized Carrie Lam and praised the young protesters in recent interviews with Hong Kong media. From our understanding of Hong Kong and CCP elite politics, Shek could not have attacked Lam without strong political backing.
2. When a Chinese official in trouble (rumors of being investigated or replaced, etc.) meets with a leading official or makes a “public appearance” (露面), it does not immediately mean that the official is no longer in danger. For instance, former Politburo member Bo Xilai still attended the 2012 Two Sessions despite intense speculation that he would not be able to due to the Wang Lijun incident; Bo was only officially investigated and dismissed as Chongqing Party Secretary in March, and was subsequently removed from the Politburo in April. With regard to Hong Kong, Xi Jinping “fully affirmed” the work of Carrie Lam’s predecessor Leung Chun-ying when he and Xi held a formal meeting on Nov. 21, 2016, but Leung ended up abandoning his re-election campaign on Dec. 9, citing family reasons.
Face is part of the reason why the CCP occasionally sends “mixed” signals about officials in trouble. With regard to Carrie Lam, the CCP and Xi Jinping cannot not demonstrate support even if she is doing a poor job of handling the Hong Kong protests or not properly following/misreading instructions from the central government. For the CCP/Xi to show disapproval of Lam would be an “own goal” and a boost for the protest movement; the CCP always strives to cover up failure and never admits to its mistakes.
The CCP’s face issue in dealing with Carrie Lam has been somewhat resolved with her being received by Xi Jinping and Han Zheng in China; if Lam were to leave her position now, the general perception would not be that Beijing “caved” on Hong Kong, but that other factors influenced her decision to step aside. It would not be surprising if Carrie Lam were to later announce her resignation for “personal reasons.”
3. It is interesting that Xi Jinping did not articulate his support for the work of the Hong Kong police in meeting Carrie Lam, while long-time Jiang Zemin faction member Han Zheng had “fully affirmed” the “dedicated work” of the police force. In August, another Jiang faction member, Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office head Zhang Xiaoming, praised the Hong Kong police for their “professionalism” and “self-restraint.”
In our analysis of the CCP factional politics and Hong Kong, we noted that the Jiang faction has an interest in escalating chaos in the city to tip the balance of the Xi-Jiang struggle in their favor (see here and here).
4. Han Zheng’s comment about backing the Hong Kong government’s to improve “social conditions” affirms our previous analysis of the CCP’s “chain stratagems” for regaining control over Hong Kong. His rhetoric about “extreme violence and destruction” not being “tolerated or accepted by any nation in the world” also benefits the interests of the Hong Kong police force.
It should be noted, however, that Han Zeng only affirmed the “dedicated work” of the Hong Kong police. This leaves ample interpretation room for the CCP and the Hong Kong government to sacrifice police officers who did not carry out sufficiently “dedicated work,” i.e. were involved in abuse of power cases, brutal treatment of protesters, etc.
SinoInsight 2
On Nov. 2, PRC state media like Xinhua republished an article titled, “An Agreement is Premised on Properly Resolving Core Concerns” (妥善解決核心關切是達成協議的前提) by the official WeChat account of “Linghumao/Taoran Notes.” The Taoran article stated that the Chinese side had proposed “three core concerns” to reaching a trade agreement with the United States as early as May:
1. The U.S. must cancel all tariffs on Chinese products. “Tariffs are the starting point of the trade dispute between both sides. If an agreement is to be reached, the imposed tariffs must be withdrawn,” the article wrote.
2. Chinese purchases of U.S. products must “accord with reality.” The two sides had reached a “consensus on purchases in Argentina” that “should not be changed at will.”
3. The “balance of the text” of the trade agreement must be improved. “All countries have their own dignity. The text of the agreement must be balanced. Currently, there are still some key issues that need to be discussed,” the article wrote.
On Nov. 3, Xinhua published an article titled, “How Can a Trade Agreement be Reached?” (經貿協議如何才能瓜熟蒂落？) by the official WeChat account of one “Long Dongqiang” (隆東腔). The article stressed that for a Sino-U.S. agreement to be reached, the issue of “properly resolving core concerns” must be taken to the next level.
OUR TAKE
1. Taoran Notes and “Long Dongqiang” may position themselves as “independent self-media,” but they are connected with official PRC media outlets. Their “self-media” status allows them to say things that are inconvenient for PRC media to do so themselves.
Taoran Notes is the public facade of the international desk at the state-owned Economic Daily. After Sino-U.S. trade negotiations broke down in May, Taoran published an article titled, “If You Want to Talk, Then Talk; if You Want a Fight, Let’s Fight” (願談則談，要打便打) that was widely circulated by official PRC media outlets.
2. The “three core concerns” raised in the Nov. 2 Taoran article were first raised by PRC vice premier Liu He in May when he was in Washington D.C. for the 11th rounds of Sino-U.S. trade talks. On May 10, Liu stressed that the Chinese side will not back down on “important principles” and that “three core concerns” must be addressed during the trade negotiations.
Based on our analysis, the escalating “you die, I live” factional struggle in the CCP will make it very difficult for Xi Jinping to reach any sort of trade deal with America. Also, Xi himself faces very high levels of political risk. As Xi’s representative in the trade talks, Liu He had no option in May but to maintain a tough stance (“three core concerns”) to stay “politically correct” and help the Xi camp deflect attacks of being “soft” on the U.S. from the Jiang faction, Party “hardliners,” and other factional interest groups.
3. According to various news reports, the U.S. and China are preparing to sign a “phase one” trade deal in either November or December. President Donald Trump’s earlier plan to meet Xi Jinping at the APEC summit in Chile to sign the trade agreement were scuttled when Chile canceled the summit to resolve domestic unrest. Against this context, the timing and content of Taoran’s Nov. 2 “three core concerns” article is particularly worth noting.
We see two possible reasons for the Taoran piece. First, the CCP could be feeling confident and arrogant enough after successfully convening the long-delayed Fourth Plenum and accounting for Trump’s impeachment troubles to make tough demands of the United States, albeit “indirectly” through a state-linked “self-media” outlet. Second, Xi’s political rivals could be seizing an opportunity to raise the bar for the reaching of a trade deal between the U.S. and China by issuing tough demands that America will find very hard to accede to.
4. Both Xi Jinping and Trump have an interest in reaching a trade deal to resolve short-term problems. While both sides could conceivably make compromises to move ahead with the deal, Trump will unlikely address the “three core concerns” in a manner which would be satisfactory for the PRC, and neither will the PRC completely back down from its demands. Further, both Xi and Trump will almost certainly be attacked by their political opposition for making concessions. In view of the complicated political situation in the U.S. and China, we believe that both sides will find it immensely difficult, if not impossible, to reach a trade agreement.
