SinoInsight 1
Tensions in Hong Kong have reignited this week with the CCP again taking steps to interfere in Hong Kong affairs and moving personnel in the PRC’s Hong Kong apparatus.
April 13
The Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office (HKMAO) and the PRC’s Hong Kong Liaison Office issued two statements condemning pan-democrat lawmakers in Hong Kong’s Legislative Council (LegCo) for filibustering to “paralyze the operation of the legislative body.”
“One can’t help thinking their behavior amounts to a breach of the [LegCo] oath, and constitutes an offense of misconduct in public office,” read the HKMAO statement.
The HKMAO named one pan-democrat lawmaker, Dennis Kwok of Hong Kong’s Civic Party, and accused him of abusing his power to interfere with the LegCo’s internal proceedings and causing delays in reviewing legislation.
April 14
Tam Yiu-chung, a Hong Kong member of the PRC National People’s Congress Standing Committee, said in an interview with Hong Kong media that lawmakers who do not perform their duties and do not display enough loyalty should be disqualified as legislators.
Tam’s remarks were widely interpreted as confirmation that the HKMAO and Hong Kong Liaison Office were using all means possible to prevent pan-democrat lawmakers from leading the LegCo.
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In an exclusive interview with Reuters, senior judges say that “the independence of Hong Kong’s judicial system is under assault from the Communist Party leadership in Beijing.”
April 15
Luo Huining, the newly installed Hong Kong Liaison Office director, strongly indicated that Beijing wants Hong Kong to quickly enact Article 23, a controversial national security law.
“If the ant-hill eroding the rule of law is not cleared, the dam of national security will be destroyed and the wellbeing of all Hong Kong residents will be damaged. There’s a need to put effort into maintaining the national security legal system and enforcement system as soon as possible,” Luo said during a speech to mark the PRC’s National Security Education Day.
Hours after Luo’s speech, the PRC State Council announced that Yang Jian, deputy director of the Hong Kong Liaison Office, had been removed from his post. The announcement did not reveal any details about Yang’s next job post.
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In a video clip released to commemorate the PRC’s National Security Education Day, Hong Kong chief executive Carrie Lam listed several developments in the anti-extradition bill protests last year that could threaten national security.
“Extremist actions that are close to terrorism emerged, including home-made bombs, possession of firearms and attacks on police officers,” she said. Lam also censured people for spreading “cold-blooded and hate speech” on social media. “It’s possible that the national security would be threatened if these illegal acts are not effectively curbed,” she said.
OUR TAKE
1. The removal of Yang Jian and his career trajectory will offer insights into the state of the CCP factional struggle.
Before being appointed deputy director of the Hong Kong Liaison Office in 2013, Yang held senior positions in propaganda and state media in Jiangxi Province and Guangdong Province. From 2000 to 2007, Yang served as president and Party Secretary of the Xinhua News Agency branch in Guangdong. From 2007 to 2013, Yang was deputy head of the provincial propaganda department and the National Radio and Television Administration in Guangdong. Yang Jian’s stint as a senior provincial propaganda official coincided with the period (2000 to 2012) where the propaganda and public security apparatuses were favored by the Jiang Zemin faction-dominated CCP regime; both apparatuses were essential for Jiang’s persecution campaign against Falun Gong. The high-level propaganda posts Yang held in Guangdong suggests that he at least has the Jiang faction’s trust. However, his slow career progression also indicates that he might not have been a Jiang faction associate or member.
From the perspective of CCP operations, if Yang Jian is not appointed to another position after leaving Hong Kong or gets a demotion, then he is almost certainly being punished for the Hong Kong Liaison Office’s failure to sway and gauge the ground sentiment during the anti-extradition bill protests and local district council elections last year. If Yang is transferred to another post of the same level, then the CCP could be giving him a “soft landing” for his failures; propaganda and media work was part of Yang’s portfolio at the Hong Kong Liaison Office. If Yang were to receive a promotion, then it would appear that the CCP does not wish to hold him accountable for its failures in Hong Kong.
From the perspective of the CCP factional struggle, if Yang fails to secure another post after Hong Kong, receives a demotion, or gets transferred to another post at the same level, then it would indicate that Xi Jinping is continuing to clear out the Hong Kong and Macau apparatus of Jiang-era officials. If Yang gets promoted, however, then it would seem that the Jiang faction’s influence over Hong Kong affairs has not waned and Xi lacks political strength to move against his political rivals.
2. From the statements issued by the HKMAO and the Hong Kong Liaison Office, as well as the remarks on “maintaining national security” by Liaison Office head Luo Huining, it is clear that the CCP wants to remove obstacles to enacting Article 23 in Hong Kong. The CCP wants Article 23 to be enacted “as soon as possible” to tighten its grip over the international financial hub, make it impossible for Hong Kong residents to carry out mass protests, and fast-forward the integration of Hong Kong into the Chinese regime ahead of the expiration of the “one country, two systems” arrangement in 2047.
Given the strong anti-CCP sentiment in Hong Kong, the CCP cannot guarantee that the pro-Beijing camp will maintain its majority in the Hong Kong LegCo after the LegCo elections in September. Thus, the CCP will likely attempt to push through Article 23 before September when conditions are more favorable to manipulating Hong Kong affairs. For instance, the CCP can come up with all sorts of reasons to arrest pan-democrat lawmakers, make them fight lawsuits, or even find ways to alter LegCo rules to prevent pan-democrat lawmakers from filibustering or protesting in the legislature. Once sufficient pan-democrat lawmakers have been sidelined, pro-Beijing lawmakers can proceed to pass Article 23.
Hong Kong residents, however, will unlikely allow the CCP a “free pass” to manipulate legislative and judicial affairs in the city. We believe that protests and turmoil could break out in Hong Kong as early as May. The Hong Kong government will likely cite the coronavirus epidemic as a reason to stop the Hong Kong people from assembling in public areas to protest. The Hong Kong people, however, showed that they can be very creative and determined when it comes to protesting during the anti-extradition bill demonstrations in 2019. Meanwhile, the Hong Kong government and police would have reservations about repeating the brutal suppression strategies used during the anti-extradition protests given the passage of the Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act of 2019 by the United States last November.
Novel protests in Hong Kong will likely cause even more headaches for the Hong Kong government and heap pressure on the CCP regime at a time when it is already facing several regime-ending crises.
SinoInsight 2
During a PRC State Council Joint Prevention and Control Mechanism press conference on April 10, Yi Peizhuang, a first-level inspector of the PRC Ministry of Civil Affair’s social assistance department, said that local governments had “assisted and protected” nearly 400 children who had lost their parents or guardians as a result of the coronavirus epidemic.
OUR TAKE
1. Before Yi Peizhuang’s disclosure, observers have suspected for some time that a fair number of children in Wuhan could have been orphaned by the coronavirus epidemic. According to information on Chinese social media that began circulating on March 12, there is a special quarantine area in Wuhan’s Qingshan District where children age 17 and below are housed. These children are said to have lost their parents and guardians, and were being cared for by volunteer workers. At the time, volunteer workers were soliciting donations of supplies to help the orphans.
2. According to PRC law, an orphan in China is a minor under 18 years of age who has lost his or her parents. By PRC law, the close relatives (grandparents and siblings) of the minor have an obligation to care for the orphan, while other relatives and friends can act as guardians. Guardians can also come from the work unit of the minor’s parents, local resident or village committees, or local civil affairs departments.
Given what is stated in PRC law, Yi Peizhuang’s disclosure about 400 children who had lost their parents or guardians as a result of the coronavirus epidemic is very troubling. Because the CCP only changed the one-child policy two years ago, most of the 400 orphans are likely the only child. And if local governments have become their guardians, that means that each orphaned child represents the destruction of an extended family (parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, etc.) as a result of the epidemic.
An extended family in China has roughly two to six people. If we presume that each orphan has three extended family members, then the 400 orphans represent 3,600 coronavirus deaths. This figure is higher than the official total coronavirus death count in China as of April 15 (3,342 deaths). Because some coronavirus orphans could have been adopted by collateral relatives and given the CCP’s penchant for manipulating numbers, we have reason to believe that the true number of coronavirus orphans is much higher than 400.
3. We believe that Yi Peizhuang’s disclosure of the 400 orphans indirectly proves that the CCP has been issuing fraudulent data on the coronavirus and is at least greatly underreporting the total number of deaths. Yi’s disclosure is akin to previous revelations about funeral homes operating cremation furnaces for 24 hours, the long waiting period for receiving cremated ashes in Wuhan, and the mysterious disappearance of 21 million cellphone users in China during the January-February period.
SinoInsight 3
During a coronavirus task force meeting on April 15, U.S. President Donald Trump was asked to comment on a Fox News report that COVID-19 had emerged from a Wuhan laboratory. Trump said that he was aware of the report and added that “we are doing a very thorough examination of this horrible situation that happened.”
When asked if he had discussed with Xi Jinping the U.S. Department of State’s concerns about lax safety protocols at a Wuhan lab, Trump said, “I don’t want to discuss what I talked to him about the laboratory. I just don’t want to discuss it. It’s inappropriate right now.”
In an interview with Fox News that evening, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was asked to comment on Trump’s reply about the coronavirus origins. Pompeo said, “What we do know is we know that this virus originated in Wuhan, China. We know that there is the Wuhan Institute of Virology just a handful of miles away from where the wet market was. There’s still lots to learn. You should know that the United States Government is working diligently to figure this out.”
Pompeo added, “The Chinese Government needs to come clean. It needs to be accountable. It needs to explain what happened and why it is the case that that information wasn’t made more broadly available.”
Pompeo also said, “We’re doing a full investigation of everything we can to learn how it is the case that this virus got away, got out into the world, and now has created so much tragedy, so much death here in the United States and all around the world, and at enormous cost to the global economy as well.”
OUR TAKE
1. We predicted the Trump administration’s investigation into the origins of the coronavirus in the Feb. 20, 2020 edition of this newsletter. We wrote: “Should the Wuhan epidemic get ‘out of hand’ at a later date or the spread of COVID-19 outside China reach pandemic levels, the Trump administration will likely push Beijing hard for more information about the origins of the coronavirus to better fight the epidemic at home and abroad.”
2. Trump indicated that he had discussed the Wuhan laboratory with Xi Jinping, but declined to elaborate on their conversation. Recently, both Trump and Secretary Pompeo have also toned down their hawkish attitude towards the CCP regime (Trump and Pompeo have stopped referring to COVID-19 as the “Chinese virus” or the “Wuhan virus”), notably around the period where Trump and Xi had their phone call on March 27. We believe that Trump and Pompeo could have altered their attitude towards the CCP regime to facilitate bilateral cooperation on the coronavirus, the Xi leadership’s implementation of the Sino-U.S. “phase one” deal, and possibly after accounting for the political situation in the CCP.
Trump and Pompeo, however, could again adopt an openly hawkish attitude towards the CCP regime when circumstances change, including a second infectious disease outbreak, Beijing’s failure to fulfill the “phase one” deal, and increasing domestic pressure on Trump to hold China accountable for the “CCP virus.” At that time, “the Trump administration could demand that Xi be more forthcoming about the links between regime biosecurity and COVID-19, or the PRC should get ready to face tough U.S. sanctions.”
3. The Trump administration’s inquest into the origins of the coronavirus is almost certainly a key reason why Xi Jinping took the risk of calling attention to biosecurity issues in the regime during a high-level coronavirus epidemic meeting on Feb. 14 and why he “admitted” that he had given orders to deal with the coronavirus outbreak as early as Jan. 7 in a Feb. 3 speech that was published in Qiushi Journal on Feb. 15.
We explore the far-reaching implications of Xi’s mid-February statements concerning the coronavirus and what it means for Xi and the CCP when Trump eventually demands that they “come clean” about the origins of the coronavirus in our forthcoming special report, “Coronavirus Pushes CCP Factional Struggle to Inflection Point.” A digital copy of the report will be sent to SinoInsider subscribers via email on May 4, 2020.
