Hong Kong was seized by Britain to facilitate its opium trade. After a century of humiliation for China, Hong Kong was returned to China in 1997 under a complex arrangement. Foreign countries should keep out of what is a domestic issue for China. CIA, take note.
For months our media gave us wall-to-wall coverage of riots and blockades in Hong Kong. Little attempt was made to explain who the leaders were, what they really wanted except ‘democracy’, and who was backing and encouraging them. US flags were prominent but our media did not regard that as significant.
Hong Kong was not democratic under UK colonial rule. Have the media forgotten! It is not democratic today and will not be in the future. That is a fact of real life.
More recently our media failed to tell the full story on the expulsion of four ‘pro democracy’ law makers from the Legislative Council in Hong Kong.
But what is the real story?
The Legislative Council had been effectively paralysed for many months through filibuster by a group of “pro-democrats”. The four were leaders of that movement.
On top of that, they had been urging the US government to impose sanctions on Hong Kong. But it is illegal for Hong Kongers to collude with foreign powers. As a result some are moving to Taiwan.
What precisely were their demands is not clear. Perhaps they were not clear themselves. But encouraging US intervention in China’s internal affairs was provocative.
They were certainly vocal in support of the “5 demands”, one of them being the Chief Executive’s resignation (or perhaps the CE and the principal secretaries).
They were also demanding amnesty for all crimes – however heinous – committed in the
course of the disturbances and at the same time, an official enquiry into “police brutality”. Joshua Wong was asked last September by a journalist from The Australian what precisely was his objective: He said “after the Police have been crushed then perhaps the government will come out and talk to us…”
Earlier this month, Nathan Law, Joshua Wong and Emily Lau were interviewed on ABC Radio National: Not once were they asked what exactly was their program for Hong Kong, apart from wanting “Democracy”. Those interviews seemed more like RN providing platforms for the interviewees.
What would the Australian Government do if our Parliament was paralysed by filibuster, unable to pass laws for JobKeeper and JobSeeker, and at the same time a group of MPs was urging the Kremlin to impose sanctions on us.
How would Canberra react ?
John Menadue is the Founder and Editor in Chief of Pearls and Irritations. He was formerly Secretary of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet under Gough Whitlam and Malcolm Fraser, Ambassador to Japan, Secretary of the Department of Immigration and CEO of Qantas.
Comments
85 responses to “Hong Kong is part of China. Our media fails to grasp this basic point.”
The usual common sense from John. The western mainstream media have, on this as on many other issues, simply acted as stenographers to power in Canberra and Washington. Investigative journalism has in recent times been marginalised to the alternative media scene, which is growing rapidly as a result of those failures of the mainstream.
Sir,
In the arguments below, I notice the tendency to tell commentators who defend a certain point of view favourable to the Chinese to go and live in China. This is not a reasonable way to debate a point. Many of us do not like to live in China, India, Saudi Arabia, Cuba, Indonesia etc. But that doesn’t mean that they should not have their own form of government or that their governments are necessarily unacceptable by our standards or norms. The second point is that nobody mentions the other half, or so, of the HongKong population who choose to remain silent or are pro-Beijing.
I find the tendency for people to dictate to China, India, Indonesia or Cuba or or any other country they do not fully understand quite patronising. There is the underlying assumption that these governments are immutable and incapable of change. Even if they do change, it does not have to be in the direction that we choose. I learned to appreciate governments, whose political systems are alien to me, by what they do for their people because I am sensitive to places where people work extremely hard for very little. Many of the countries in Asia are trying their best for their people. Criticising them openly does not help. Quiet diplomacy does. Being patient, understanding and lending a helping hand wherever we can helps.
Sincerely,
Teow Loon Ti
yes that’s right Teow, preach the right of “own” gov, one YOU don’t have to live under.
Sir,
I don’t like to live in the US too; but that doesn’t mean that they are not entitled to run their own government instead of one that is a clone of another.
Sincerely,
Teow Loon Ti
Thank you John.
These days, I’m no longer sure what to think about our beloved ABC.
Today’s article by ABC journalist Ian Verrender even proposed (on the behest of Washington) the novel idea of Australia slashing her own wrist to spite China by banning iron ore export to China (“Australia’s biggest export could be key against tensions boiling over with China”). It’s pouring fuel to fire.
It appears Australia’s hatred of China is now so intense that kamikaze, sacrificing thousands of Aussie jobs as collateral human-economic-bombs and blowing up our own prosperity is now a real option.
Is this what ScoMo meant by “Australians being Australians”? Or just sheer bloody minded stupidity?
It is NWO policy to break up the Empires still operating.
China had to invent a language for all the nations, peoples and religions it governed.
Thank you John for an excellent article. It’s exasperating hearing Bill Birtles, ABC China correspondent now at large, constantly reporting about this and as you point out, with never a shred of background or analysis to accompany his “pronouncements”. Apart from the CIA, who have form going back many decades for destabilising governments deemed to be unsatisfactory, Evangelical Christian activities are playing a part too I believe. Regent Christian University in Vancouver, BC has many students from Hong Kong. Mike Baird was a graduate.
Reply to d-n-e :
Inaccurate and just pure ignorance. Many poor fellow Aussies are now in this category due to the propaganda and inaccurate media reports they are exposed to. It is a pity. Without wise Aussie like John Menadue and his Blog, they will be even worse in spreading lies like flies. WE ARE NOT CHINESE APOLOGISTS. We are exposing you to the light of truth. We are all human. We all make mistakes. Some mistakes are worse than the other. However we all can become better human beings if we learn from one another and compare the truth from lie and help one another out. We did that with China and her peoples since 1972. I advise these ignorant fellow Aussies to go to Hong Kong and mainland China and see for themselves the truth of modern China.
I lived in HK for 5 yrs. When I first arrived Hong Kongers were, in general, supportive of the mainland. I do not believe that’s been the case for quite some time.
Ka Sing Chua, you said “However we all can become better human beings if we learn from one another and compare the truth from lie and help one another out…..” Now does that align with Han behaviour with the massive detention of Uighers and towards Tibetans etc? Detaining those protestors fleeing to Taiwan and their likely jailing. Lololol you aren’t even allowed to leave your own country!
Poster after poster claims CIA involvement without a skerrick of evidence, and slam the protesters, again without evidence.
I accept HK as part of China (legally), but I don’t accept that China “owns” Hong Kongers (do you recall China’s threat to ignore the Brit visas for HKers attempting to leave) and I don’t accept China’s claim on the SCS or Taiwan and those are two points I think the west should be prepared to physically dispute with China.
Sorry if the truth hurts (Chinese Apologists) and I would add the ignorance is on your side, ignorance of CCP behaviour.
There are none so blind as those who will not see… . Here are some skerricks of evidence (including the last one which is from the CIA itself). But it needs somebody to look at them with an open mind:
https://www.nybooks.com/daily/2013/04/09/cias-cancelled-war-tibet/
https://www.workers.org/2019/12/44963/
https://www.scmp.com/comment/opinion/article/3090306/hong-kong-perfect-target-cia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Yellowbird
https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/document/cia-rdp69b00369r000200240120-5
An important point to note is that data in cyberspace is continually being scanned and subject to censorship by the giant computers of the NSA. To cleanse the system of anything damaging to the prescribed narrative from Washington.
I suppose, from your perspective, we all should be on the foreign influence register.
What makes you think we are anything but loyal Australians? There are no reds under the bed. In fact according to our Australian intelligence, the only scary guys are white fascist terrorists, with whom you perhaps have some empathy for?
You obviously don’t read your own links!
Link 1.” For much of the past century, US relations with Tibet have been characterized by kowtowing to the Chinese and hollow good wishes for the Dalai Lama. As early as 1908, William Rockhill, a US diplomat, advised the Thirteenth Dalai Lama that “close and friendly relations with China are absolutely necessary, for Tibet is and must remain a portion of the Ta Ts’ing [Manchu] Empire for its own good.” Not much has changed with the Fourteenth Dalai Lama one hundred years later. After a meeting in 2011 with President Obama in the White House Map Room—the Oval Office being too official—the Dalai Lama was ushered out the back door, past the garbage cans. All this, of course, is intended to avoid condemnation from Beijing, which regards even the mildest criticism of its Tibet policy as “interference.”
And it was the first para; Modern History!
Link 2. A mouth piece for a Marxist-Leninist political party.
I can see why you like them, as a China Apologist it fits in well, doesn’t it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Workers_World_Party
Link 3. A SCMP article! You mean an company that if it took a different path would not
exist. I doubt the shareholders would be happy with that and I guess the journo
would be arrested for “separatist” ideals. Pub date June 2020!
Link 4. This takes the cake and shows you are REALLY tone death. A wiki link
about an org involved in helping to get Tiananmen Square protestors out
of China into HK. My guess is the BRITS who controlled HK at the time were
aware and for one, good on the CIA if they were involved.
If I was you Mr Man Lee, I wouldn’t be too public about supporting Chinese
behaviour over that issue. Mind you on P&I you’re likely to get a recommendation
Link 5. Hang on, is that the same as Chinese flights breaching Taiwanese
and Japanese airspace to prove a military response?
“There are no reds under the bed. In fact according to our Australian intelligence, the only scary guys are white fascist terrorists, with whom you perhaps have some empathy for?”
For starters our Intelligence orgs are warning us on China; have you not read the news.
As to me having sympathy for white terrorists; that’s bloody pathetic, is that the best you can come up with?
The one obvious mark of a China Apologist is the ignoring of Chinese behaviour domestically and internationally.
I think we have a paid troll here having discovered that Pearl’s and Irritations is a forum that questions the establishment. Now we can’t have that can we?
Questions the establishment in most respects, but with regards to China is as bad as the Murdoch press, just in the opposite direction.
This site throws accusations against the US (and rightly so in lots of respects), but when it comes to China it’s so sycophantic it’s sickening. You can see no wrong and turn a blind eye to everything.
I now understand what they mean by fake left.
Your not listening, yet I suppose that is to be expected. No one here dogmatically accepts China’s policies,. Rather what is being questioned is the hateful deceptions of the West in relation to China and those who are being duped by the cunning hatefilled deceptiin, a deception that began in the 18th century when China sought though unsuccessfully to stand against Western economic arrogance. That the UK thought it could traffic opium into China at the end of a gun barrel against the demands of the emporer is one of many instances of economic arrogance, an arrogance that led to centuries of political humiliation. In the face of this long history of humiliation that the Anglo American Establishment in the 21st century continues this hateful deception is absolutely appalling and that you can be their hatefilled advocate is equally appalling.
Yes, I agree with all that you say about Chinese / western history back then, but it’s no excuse for China’s abusing their own people? Your 100 yrs of political humiliation is a pathetic bottom of the barrel excuse.
It’s tiring listening to the excuses, I guess that’s how therapists feel listening to domestic violence perpetrators.
Nice factless ad hominem attack.
As I had requested in a previous request, substantiate your claim of abuse please.
Lol here we go, with Uygur and Tibet again. Where’s your source? Fairfax? Murdoch? Oh wait let me save you the trouble and tell you, it’s Adrian Zenz, a born-again far-right fundamentalist Christian who opposes homosexuality and gender equality. Normally he would be ignored but he is a useful idiot for the western propaganda apparatus.
How did he get the 2 million Uygur in detention figure from? He got 8 overseas Uyghurs, asked them how many people they know are in reeducation camps and did a simple extrapolation on the entire population of Xinjiang province. If you believe that sounds totally reasonable, then I got a bridge to sell you.
https://tbinternet.ohchr.org/Treaties/CERD/Shared%20Documents/CHN/INT_CERD_NGO_CHN_31915_E.pdf
For someone who proclaims on “evidence”, you have a long way to go. Who knows, next thing, you might tell me to you get all your news from ASPI.
After all, Peter Hatcher, Zenz and ASPI seems to be the only 3 sources for 99% of your anti China propaganda in Australian MSM these days. Budget is getting tight.
China is trying to lift the livelihood of its Muslim population while the 5 eyes is trying to bomb Muslims back to the stone age.
Never heard of Adrian and I voted YES, so I pretty much would have ignored Adrian anyway.
Yeah, China’s “educating” the Uighurs, just like Pol Pot was educating Cambodians.
Keep your head in the sand if you like, it does have the advantage of being temperate stable!
Sure show me some evidence on what goes on in these camps other than NED, ASPI and Zenz and maybe we have an adult conversation.
Never heard of Zenz? Then where did you get this Uygur crap from? Lol don’t tell me New York Times, where do YOU think they get THEIR source from genius?
So next you’re going to tell me that the Jewish concentration camps were “education” camps!
Nice of you to admit this “education” thingy is widespread.
As expected, for someone who admits he doesn’t even know what source his daily dose of propaganda comes from, no evidence, just rhetorics and strawmans. Well done sir. You really convinced everyone.
As expected, for someone who admits he doesn’t even know what source his daily dose of propaganda comes from, no evidence, just rhetorics and strawmans. Well done sir. You really convinced everyone.
And yours is no different.
Convince! lololololol. Everyone here is convinced, just like YOU!
Btw, no comment on how China treats its citizens like chattels.
Here’s a start for you, genius.
https://www.nytimes.com/topic/subject/uighurs
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=washington+post+and+uighurs&t=h_&ia=web
you can add the Guardian and FT.
Btw, are all your sources from the Chinese gov?
What western establishment newspapers are your source, geepers. Were these not the same telling us that Iraq had WMD and the Govt of Libya was killing its own citizens?
Never accepted the WMD argument, thus never accepted the bs given for invading Iraq.
The M.E. debacle was of the west’s own making.
Hahahahahahaha.
You linked a Chinese Gov Anti Discrimination piece, you are converted, aren’t you! I would have thought Adrian would be on equal footing with the Chinese Gov as a source.
Do you have any Russian papers for me?
And you had the cheek to call me a genius. You apologists really are blind when it comes to understanding how your “source” may be viewed.
So could you please advise on your source for the detention claim. Thankyou.
Australia has been invaded, physically, overtly invaded, three times in recent history.
The first was in the late 18th century when the Brits came with their troopers and their convicts and demolished Indigenous Australia. Until that is acknowledged and addressed, the continuing misunderstanding and mistreatment of Indigenous Australians can only continue.
The second was in the 1940’s when Japan attempted to invade with bombs in Darwin and submarines in Sydney. This attempt was defeated.
The third is today. We are being invaded by the USA with the bipartisan connivance of our Federal Government. One predictable outcome of this is our soldiers are sent overseas to aid the US in its unnecessary wars. We then express dismay and disgust when the young men and women we send overseas to kill people, kill people.
Bring our troops home, now. We can then better address our war crimes and the warrior culture that produced them.
You can’t just say Hong Kong “IS” part of China as if it’s an immutable law of nature. Countries have been invaded, joined together, split up, or become independent since before the time of the nation state, from Scotland to Singapore.
OK, so the Australian media have been pretty superficial in their coverage of the Hong Kong protests, and the leaders and spokespeople might have been hot-headed and incoherent. But surely the wishes of hundreds of thousands of demonstrators have some moral force, even if they are doomed to failure.
Would anyone here submit gladly to living under the Chinese legal system?
You can say Hong Kong IS part of China just as readily as you can cay that Tasmania is part of Australia. Only those seeking to provoke conflict and destabilize China (e.g. US administrations) argue that it is anything else but part of China.
Rubbish. HK was seperate from China for over 100 yrs, the people don’t view themselves as Chinese. China is destabilising itself, as its done for 500 yrs in an endeavour to expand / maintain / territorial boundaries that are somewhat dubious.
And exactly how did Britain acquire Hong Kong, the Emperor of the Ching Dynasty quietly give permission or was it by the forced of treaty Britain militarily and violently imposed on the emperor following attempts to oulaw Britain’s opium trade into inland China? Tis sad that China’s own citizens that are not apologists, who ever that may be, have a Wikipedia knowledge of the history of their own country.
I’m well aware of the history of HK and the opium wars etc, but that doesn’t change the fact that HKers have been free of China for over a 100 yrs. Countries boundaries change all the time.
China stuffed up its handling of HK and Taiwan can now see what they will suffer if they’re foolish enough to swallow any of China’s promises.
No you are not aware of the history, you have failed that lesson, nor are you aware of modern history especially that of the covert relations between the US foreign policy establishment, its paid proxies such as NED and the campaign to destroy socialist China via hatefilled campaigns of aggression in Hong Kong Taiwan Tibet. Those so called democrat “Hong Kongers” who represent the minority of the Peoples of Hong Kong with the support of a local media owned by organised crime syndicates, working hand in glove with the leaders of this foreign campaign who for centuries humiliated China, betray the peoples, your brothers and sisters, of China. I suspect that you are a part of this campaign.
You complain incessantly about the west while turning a deliberate blind eye to the atrocities of your beloved China. The west has its issues, but they’re nowhere near China’s or the USSR in murdering the number of their own people that they have.
My history is fine. Edit: And my heart is clear, which imo, yours isn’t.
It’s not my beloved china, not sure where you get that from, I guess from your beloved um ahh…
Separated from China as a result of post-opium war “treaties.” And what democracy did they live under in Hong Kong in those 100 years? Who elected Chris Patten Governor? Certainly not the people of Hong Kong. d_n_e you are trotting out propaganda that will only damage the people of Hong Kong
Agree with your attitude about the Brits time running HK, but that has nothing to do with Hong Kongers and the now! So your attitude is the Brits were shit so HKers should suck it up with China.
Btw, does China’s 100 yrs of political humiliation also act as a cover for the murder of China’s people during Moa’s time?
Like I said, fake lefty.
There is no prospect of Hong Kong becoming an independent country and anyone who leads Hong Kong people to believe that there is such a prospect is doing them a disservice and simply serving the interest of those who want to destabilize the region.
That’s what I thought about East Timor once. I was wrong.
However as I said, I feel the protestors are doomed to failure. The most they could hope for, and it seems an increasingly forlorn hope, is that the One Country, Two Systems agreement be adhered to until 2047, as China originally promised.
The CCP is like no other, they will do Tiananmen Square all over again before there is any independence; independence will never happen, state mass murder before that comes about.
There always was a good case to make that Timor was not part of Indonesia. Just as a good case can be made that West Papua is not part of Indonesia. (ethnically different from the Javanese. The “referendum was a joke.) But I fear that many lives would be lost if the West Papuan’s try to win their independence through up-risings or serious protest. No country would come to their aid.
Hong Kong IS part of China. Hong Kong people would be recognised as Chinese the world over. It is the outside meddling that promotes the false hope of independence that hinders progress on a One Country, Two systems approach. The sooner we let the Chinese sort out their own affairs, the better. Just as we must sort out our indigenous divide.
“Just as a good case can be made that West Papua is not part of Indonesia. (ethnically different from the Javanese…..”
What, and the Uighurs, Tibetans and Mongolians aren’t?
Where did the Han originate from?
“Hong Kong people would be recognised as Chinese the world over. It is the outside meddling that promotes the false hope of independence that hinders progress on a One Country, Two systems approach”
Hkers would be recognised like they recognise themselves, as HKers.
Re the ‘one country, two systems’, China screwed that up themselves in the way they dealt with HK and its people.
BTW, you still haven’t answered whether or not you view HKers as chattels of China, for China to do as it pleases?
Agree with you on HK’s independence. If China hadn’t abused the “one country, two systems” we wouldn’t be having this discussion. This is the first time you have written anything of sense.
Now, maybe could could extend your thinking about how China could turn around the mess its made of this.
Edit: btw, STILL no comment from you if HKers are just chattels “owned” by the Chinese! I guess your fake left view is the state own all Chinese people, that does seem to be the CCP view of ethnic Chinese wherever they may live, and regardless of whether or not they were born in China. Well, what’s your view on that?
The Chinese, including those in Hong Kong, must sort out their own problems. It is not up to me or Trumpian puppets like you to interfere in their affairs.
will you stop connecting me to trump, it’s hurting my self-esteem, you China Apologist slash Fake Lefty.
You fruitcake
When you stop trotting out Trumpian propaganda, I’d be happy to do so. A host of informed observers on this site have demolished your propaganda. Have you asked yourself why Hong Kong’s status as part of China, has become an issue over the past four years when it was not previously an issue?
And under Australia’s legal system that persecutes Witness X and his legal council?
Despite that scandal, I’d prefer to live under Australian law than Chinese. What about you? (And it’s counsel, Doctor).
I don’t make preferences. We deal with the legal tradition that we find ourselves in.
John, when I was in Hong Kong early this year it was reported in the SCMP that Carrie Lam and the mainland rep had said it was possible for the “one country, two systems” arrangement to be further extended. This was during the ongoing demonstrations. I have never seen any mention of this since.
John, are you on the foreign influence register?
I always thought that Hong Kong island was British territory and the New Territories on the mainland were on a 100 yr lease and that the Brits handed back the island as it would have been impossible to run it separately. Am I wrong?
Usual Chinese apologists out and about.
Swing and a miss champ. You are wrong. In 1841, China ceded the island to the British with the Chuenpi Convention and in 1842 the Treaty of Nanking was signed which formally ended the First Opium War. In 1898, Britain was granted an additional 99 years of rule over Hong Kong under the Second Convention of Peking. The island was from then always subject to lease and in 1997 the lease was up. Accusing one of our most respected Australians and public servants of disloyalty was a nice touch to add to your totally inaccurate comment.
Sorry CHAMP, but did you not see the question mark at the end?
However HK Island was Brit territory ceded or otherwise and never required giving back due to the lease expiry of the New Territories. I recall at the time when Thatcher pointed that out the Chinese leader responded “they could just take it”.I think you need to prove this “The island was from then always subject to lease and in 1997 the lease was up.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hong_Kong
Respected sure, but also as bloody one-sided as the Murdoch press.
Oh, the peer reviewed scholarly Wikipedia is your source, deary me, I submit and agree the scholarly accounts such as Hsu’s The Rise of Modern China must be fake news.
You’re a busy boy tonight!
As a source I think wiki is pretty much as good as anything else with regards to HK Island and the New Territory leases.
Have you chipped all the other wiki links at P&I, plenty of them? Didn’t think so.
Wikipedia is for the lazy who just want convenience and can’t be bothered with long hours studying those who spent decades studying and writing on the history of China. Those who prefer this lazy convenience insult those who have dedicated dare I say sacrificed their short life to scholarship of the history of China. Shame on you.
SMH. What, do I need to have access to academic material to argue a point that wiki will support just as well? Btw, still no response on all the other wiki links used by others supporting your twisted fake left viewpoint!
Presumably you believe that the constitutional monarchy Manzhouguo was not part of China on the same blind sinophobic logic as your claim in regard to Hong Kong. Manzhouguo was recognised as a soveriegn state by Vichy France and Croatia (under the Ustasi) so there you go you have historical precedent.
Wrong again. Never required? In July of 1940, Churchill stated “We desire to see China’s status and integrity preserved, and as was indicated in our Note of 14th January, 1939, we are ready to negotiate with the Chinese Government, after the conclusion of peace, the abolition of extraterritorial rights, the rendition of concessions and the revision of treaties on the basis of reciprocity and equality,” affirming territorial integrity and relinquishment of extra-territorial rights in China. The territorial integrity of China and decolonization was incorporated into the August 1941 Atlantic Charter . Roosevelt promised the handing back of Hong Kong to China at the end of the war. Britain gave up its claim to Hong Kong in 1942.
What you have quoted is nothing but talk, the British did not negotiate any changes, and I’m sure you’re aware of that.
Your only concern is your fake left beliefs with no regard for the people of HK, who you view as just chattels owned by the Chinese.
Talk? Thats some conversation. The British agreed to relinquish extra-territorial rights in China. Thats Hong Kong. In China, the citizens of Great Britain, the United States, France and later Japan had extraterritoriality under the unequal treaties. Great Britain was the first to impose such a treaty on China, in the 1842 Treaty of Nanking. On January 1, 1942, at a meeting in representatives of 26 governments (the United States, Great Britain, the Soviet Union, China, Australia, Belgium, Canada, Costa Rica, Cuba, Czechoslovakia, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Greece, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, India, Luxembourg, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Norway, Panama, Poland, South Africa, Yugoslavia) signed a “Declaration by United Nations” in which they pledged their support for the Atlantic Charter’s principles.
Yes Australia signed. Just talk. So much for shared values then champ.
Yep, just talk like a lot of bs countries sign.
As to shared values, about the same values you share with those people who actually live in HK today, while you use every bs excuse from 100 yrs ago to how bad they had it with the British to justify China doing a Tiananmen Square on HK. Just so your Fake Left views are held up.
Well done CHAMP, authoritarian states need more people with your morale compass.
Some i regard as chatterers owned by the US?
And d_n_e are you on the foreign influence register? Hidden behind three letters you appear to run Trumpian propaganda.
Where’s the Trumpian propaganda?
This is really pathetic.
You mean you are like Scotty – Trump who?
School report
Dear Mrs Matters,
Paul needs to try harder.
I loath Trump, would have voted for bernie, and biden isn’t trump which is really the only point going for him.
Exactly how I understand it, too, John. My first visit there was almost 50 years ago – a dozen times since. Family connections, some lie buried there – and connections of friends, too. The Gang of Three I noted on the ABC News last night – those feted and funded by the CIA and the hidden propaganda arms of the US. There was a time probably till around the years of my first visit to HK when the only Chinese permitted around The Peak were the domestic servants and gardeners. Not especially democratic. Yes, Opium Wars and theft – that’s more the British colonial style! Your point about the shoe being on the Australian foot is more than valid – it is the only view we should hold – and stop this fostering of a vain call for democracy – when even here in Australia what we seem to be developing is a US political oligarchy kind of LNP (ALP?) elite always pushing forward in front to promote a US agenda – Afghanistan, anti-China rhetoric – while studiously averting gaze from the thousands of First Nations locked up in our Uyghur-like gulag gaols – the dreadful treatment of asylum-seekers – it is still going on-and-on into the eighth year of these Morrison/Dutton/Pezzullo cruelties! Surely it’s time to advocate for the UN to intervene…
Sanctions should be imposed on Australia over the indigenous genocide and the failure of restitution. The health gap is the worst in the world. And there is the need for Nuremburg Trials approach to the atrocities in Afghanistan. I am prepared to go to Beijing to discuss the need for sanctions and take Beijing gold to get an astro turf outfit up and running here. I am prepared to call for the physical beating of the NSW coppers. I would expect to be charged as soon as i hit the Sydney Airport arrival lounge.
Thankyou!
And what would the Australian government do if rioters vandalized an Australian city and demanded its seccession?
We have a precedent. Lance Sharkey got 3 years for sedition (upheld by the High Court) for merely suggesting that the Australian people would welcome the entry of the Red Army up George Street, Sydney.
What rioters? Oh, you mean those protestors who just want some say in how their country is run. If you’re so enamoured with how China rules maybe you should give up your citizenship and move there.
I mean the rioters who smashed and set fire to building, attacked police with iron bars etc. This would not be tolerated in Australia.
You seem to have forgotten the police brutality, which isn’t unusual for apologists. When pushed, people shove. Oh, but I forgot; it was the CIA.
The Hong Kong police showed remarkable restraint. How many protestors were shot dead? None. Compare this to the USA where on numerous occasions dozens of protestors have been shot dead. There are so many “incidents” that I could not possibly list half of them here but they range from the Kent State shootings of anti-Vietnam war protestors, to the use of flash grenades, tear gas and armoured vehicles in Ferguson in 2014. Others you might recall are the July 1964 killing of a 15-year-old African America, James Powell, in front of his friends and about a dozen other witnesses by a policeman who fired three shots. Rioting followed resulting in one killed, 118 injured, and 465 arrested.
In the same year, in Rochester, riots broke out after rumours of police brutality, resulting in more deaths; 350 injured and 1000 arrested.
The following year, the Los Angeles Watts Riots broke out, resulting in 34 deaths, 1,032 injuries and 3,438 arrests. In the same city, in 1992, we had the Rodney King Riots, which followed the acquittal of police officers who had been videotaped beating up King. And of course we have the host of recent near military police actions following the killing of George Floyd. Can you please provide your references to equivalent police action in Hong Kong?
A good comparator is the killings and extra-judicial murders of demonstrators in Hong Kong under the British. Trade unionists were taken and shot by British commanded police in 1967. I wish to raise the memory of Tsang Ming (曾明) who was summarily executed by the Hong Kong police and Lai Chung (黎松) who was wounded by Hong Kong police and then drowned by them. Both were workers with Towngas. There were many other workers beaten to death by HK police. Over 70 people were killed by the HK police. The awful piece of work residing in Buckingham Palace awarded the HK police royal status after the butchery in 1969. The hypocracy of the British is staggering.
I was not aware of this Paul and I suspect that very few in Australia know of these events. I wonder if the demonstrators in Hong Kong, who hark back to their British colonial past, know of this history
Why aren’t you requiring proof of this horrendous crime? Absolute double standards.
I’m happy to ask Paul for his sources. But d_n_e why don’t you have any credible sources ? Is it because you merely trot out the anti-Chinese line that Donald Trump and his administration promote?
and you likewise, except you’re so invested in your fake left persona it goes right over your head.
Edit: will you stop associating me with Trump, it’s really playing with my head? Stop being nasty; anyone but the orange lifebouy.
What has left got to do with it in your genuine rightwing neoliberal existence…
Thank you John, the Australian media has been utterly supine to the USA narrative that all things China are bad, evil and to be demonised. This is a really ignorant attitude and that these violent ‘heros’ can be interviewed in the most superficial, non critical way as you describe is simply an appalling waste of readers time and an insult to their intelligence. However so many ozzies do their ‘hate china’ sessions every day and reinforce the prejudice.
Speaking of which how many ozzies reconcile a fair go with this report at Mintpressnews dot com entitled “Cuba could be on the brink of a revolutionary covid vaccine, but US sanctions are slowing it down”
Why is such a small harmless nation still being assaulted for daring to be free from the USA? Is that a fair go? So Australia’s silence and obeisance to all things USA is shameful and craven and I don’t expect it to sing a different tune when it comes to denigrating China’s sovereignty.