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Pompeo’s Hong Kong Declaration Shows U.S. Will Hold Chinese Communist Party Accountable

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Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has told Congress that Hong Kong is no longer sufficiently autonomous from the People’s Republic of China, which may mean it will no longer receive different legal treatment from the United States.

Pompeo’s statement was simply a reflection of reality. The People’s Republic of China is taking away the territory’s autonomy.

The Chinese Communist Party’s equivocation during the COVID-19 pandemic, and now China’s announcement last week that it is about to pass a national security law that will allow it to rule Hong Kong without the niceties of the rule of law, were the last straw.

In a briefing with members of the foreign policy community, Pompeo fulminated, “This is a pattern and the Chinese Communist Party will have to be held accountable for the things they have done to endanger the security of the American people.”

Pompeo’s initial statement was issued in response to requirements in the 1992 Hong Kong Policy Act and the 2019 Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act. The die was cast when the act was passed: If Hong Kong is not sufficiently autonomous, it will not retain its special status.

It is not yet clear what it will look like to roll back Hong Kong’s special treatment. President Donald Trump is expected to make a statement further explaining the consequences of decertification, which will provide a clearer picture of what this move means for Hong Kong’s future and the future of U.S.-China relations.

But what is clear is that the State Department has crossed some sort of Rubicon with China’s communist leaders.

The Chinese Communist Party and President Xi Jinping did not need to make the former British colony a less free place. A financial center of 8 million people without an army, air force, or navy represents no threat to a country of 1.4 billion people with the second-largest defense budget in the world.

But it was galling to the Chinese Communist Party and Xi that anybody under their control would have freedoms such as the right to free expression, freedom of conscience, the right to property, and the right to gather peacefully.

Having to explain daily to the 1.4 billion inside mainland China that Hong Kongers wanted to retain these freedoms only reminded them that they themselves lacked them in the first place.

The idea of freedom was the threat. After years of eroding these freedoms, China’s national security law announcement forced Pompeo’s hand. In a statement Wednesday, he said, in part:

The State Department is required by the Hong Kong Policy Act to assess the autonomy of the territory from China. After careful study of developments over the reporting period, I certified to Congress today that Hong Kong does not continue to warrant treatment under United States laws in the same manner as U.S. laws were applied to Hong Kong before July 1997. No reasonable person can assert today that Hong Kong maintains a high degree of autonomy from China, given facts on the ground.

Pompeo said that China’s “intention to unilaterally and arbitrarily impose national security legislation on Hong Kong” was a “disastrous decision.” It was “only the latest in a series of actions that fundamentally undermine Hong Kong’s autonomy and freedoms and China’s own promises to the Hong Kong people under the Sino-British Joint Declaration, a U.N.-filed international treaty.”

We at The Heritage Foundation know well Hong Kong’s value as an outpost that demonstrated, every day, and for decades, the superiority of the free market system. Its low regulatory environment, rule of law, strong anti-corruption stance, and flat tax rate gave it a GDP per capita of $62,726. Mainland China, lacking all these attributes, clocks in at $15,376.

For all these reasons, Hong Kong sat atop our Index of Economic Freedom since we started it in 1995. It dropped from its position as the world’s freest economy only this year in part because of its increasingly close integration with the mainland.

Hong Kong has always been an anomaly. Britain pried the tiny island away from China in 1842 as booty from the first Opium War, making the barely populated place a permanent colony. Britain then took a 99-year lease on the adjacent Kowloon Peninsula in 1898.

In the next century Hong Kong became a powerhouse, scrambling up the value-added ladder, first making toys and textiles, then computer equipment and eventually high-end banking.

Britain did not introduce direct elections for a portion of the Legislative Council until the 1990s, but because Hong Kongers were ruled by a free and democratic colonial power, their liberal freedoms were respected.

With the lease’s end coming up, British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher saw no choice but to agree to hand the entire territory to China during negotiation with China’s then-leader Deng Xiaoping in 1984, but not before Deng gave China’s word that Hong Kong “will enjoy a high degree of autonomy, except in foreign and defense affairs.”

That document, the Sino-British Joint Declaration, is an international treaty entered into the United Nations.

China now has broken its word, and for breaking it there will be severe diplomatic consequences. Pompeo’s determination will have implications for U.S.-China relations. It will also affect the business community and the global economy.

But there can be no doubt that the Hong Kong people will bear the brunt.

As Pompeo said in his telephone briefing Wednesday: “Any harm that should befall the Hong Kong people is a consequence of the Chinese Communist Party’s actions.”

As such, it is imperative that U.S. policymakers do all that they can to stand with the Hong Kong people and preserve what is left of their liberty and prosperity while simultaneously seeking to hold China accountable for breaking its word. (For more from the author of “Pompeo’s Hong Kong Declaration Shows U.S. Will Hold Chinese Communist Party Accountable” please click HERE)

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China Overtakes U.S. as No 1 in Buying Power, but Still Clings to Developing Status

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China’s statistics agency acknowledged that as early as 2017 the nation’s economy was larger than that of the United States when measured by purchasing power, but it has insisted it remains a “developing country” as per capita output is still only 85 per cent of the average global level.

The World Bank released its new purchasing power parities (PPPs) report for 2017 this week, which showed that China’s PPP-based gross domestic product (GDP) stood at US$19.617 trillion in 2017, while the United States’ GDP was US$19.519 trillion.

The calculation of GDP by purchasing power, using the price of a common basket of goods and services, instead of using the US dollar, provides a more accurate basis to compare economic development levels. If measured by the US dollar, China’s GDP was about US$12 trillion in 2017 and US$14 trillion in 2019, which was still below the US.

China’s National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said China’s number one ranking in PPP-based GDP does not change the fact it remains “the world’s largest developing country”.

Xu Xianchun, a former deputy head of the NBS, published an article on the agency’s website on Tuesday saying that the World Bank study had overestimated China’s economic might. (Read more from “China Overtakes U.S. as No 1 in Buying Power, but Still Clings to Developing Status” HERE)

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Secret Chinese Military Data Adds New Terrifying Detail to Coronavirus Reporting

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By Isaac Stone Fish and Maria Krol Sinclair. Beijing claims that since the coronavirus pandemic began at the end of last year, there have been only 82,919 confirmed cases and 4,633 deaths in mainland China. Those numbers could be roughly accurate, and in that case a detailed account would be an important tool in judging the spread of the virus. But it’s also possible that the numbers presented to the rest of the world are vastly understated compared to Beijing’s private figures. The opaqueness and mistrust of outsiders in the Chinese Communist Party’s system makes it hard to judge—but learning more about the coronavirus data used directly by Chinese officials is invaluable for governments elsewhere.

A dataset of coronavirus cases and deaths from the military’s National University of Defense Technology, leaked to 100Reporters, offers insight into how Beijing has gathered coronavirus data on its population. The source of the leak, who asked to remain anonymous because of the sensitivity of sharing Chinese military data, said that the data came from the university. The school publishes a data tracker for the coronavirus: The online version matches with the leaked information, except it is far less detailed—it shows just the map of cases, not the distinct data.

The dataset, though it contains inconsistencies, is the most extensive dataset proved to exist about coronavirus cases in China. More importantly, it can serve as a valuable trove of information for epidemiologists and public health experts around the globe—and has almost certainly not shared with U.S. officials or doctors. (The World Health Organization and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention did not immediately respond to requests for comment.)

While not fully comprehensive, the data is incredibly rich: There are more than 640,000 updates of information, covering at least 230 cities—in other words, 640,000 rows purporting to show the number of cases in a specific location at the time the data was gathered. Each update includes the latitude, longitude, and “confirmed” number of cases at the location, for dates ranging from early February to late April. (Read more from “Secret Chinese Military Data Adds New Terrifying Detail to Coronavirus Reporting” HERE)

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New York Eases Ban, China Reports No New Cases

By Bloomberg. China reported no new coronavirus cases on May 22 and said there are two suspected cases, one local and one that was imported, according to statement posted on website of National Health Commission.

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo dropped the state’s ban on gatherings of any size Friday, issuing an executive order saying up to 10 people are now allowed to be together as long as they abide by other social distancing guidelines adopted during the coronavirus pandemic, the Associated Press reported. Hertz Global Holdings Inc. became the latest company to file for bankruptcy amid the pandemic after sweeping travel restrictions destroyed demand for its vehicles.

Singapore’s contact-tracing phone app, “Trace Together,” will remain voluntary for “as long as possible,” Foreign Minister Vivian Balakrishnan said in an interview with Sky News Australia. (Read more from “New York Eases Ban, China Reports No New Cases” HERE)

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Wuhan Bans Consumption of Wild Animals

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The city at the center of the coronavirus crisis has banned the eating of wild animals and Chinese farmers are being offered cash to quit breeding exotic animals. Both moves come amid mounting pressure for China to crack down on the illegal wildlife trade blamed by many for the pandemic that has killed more than 320,000 people.

The local administration in Wuhan, the city of about 11 million people in China’s central Hubei province where cases of the new coronavirus were first recorded late last year, announced Wednesday that the eating of all wild animals was officially banned.

The city also banned virtually all hunting of wild animals within its limits, declaring Wuhan “a wildlife sanctuary,” with the exception of government sanctioned hunting for “scientific research, population regulation, monitoring of epidemic diseases and other special circumstances.”

Wuhan also imposed strict new controls on the breeding of all wild animals, making it clear that none could be reared as food. City officials said the local administration would take part in the wider national scheme to buy wild animal breeders out.

The national plan is the first time Chinese authorities have pledged to buy out breeders in an attempt to curb exotic animal breeding, animal rights activists say. (Read more from “Wuhan Bans Consumption of Wild Animals” HERE)

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Nationwide, Feds Find Cozy Connections Between China And University Professors

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The Chinese Virus began infiltrating the United States in early 2020, but the communist country already had a foot in the door well before then.

In the last year, Campus Reform has covered multiple instances of U.S. law enforcement officials charging professors and students with lying about their ties to China while conducting U.S.-funded research and even attempting to smuggle U.S.-funded researched to China. . .

In the summer of 2019, UCLA adjunct professor Yi-Chi Shih was found guilty of conspiring to steal U.S. missile secrets for China. . .

A University of Kansas associate professor and researcher was indicted for allegedly lying about his ties to China while conducting U.S.-funded academic research. . .

The Harvard University chemistry department chair was arrested for his alleged ties to a Wuhan, China laboratory, where he was paid up to $1.5 million to build the lab, plus an additional $50,000 per month. (Read more from “Nationwide, Feds Find Cozy Connections Between China And University Professors” HERE)

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U.S. Semiconductor Giant Shuts China Factory Hailed as ‘a Miracle’, in Blow to Beijing’s Chip Plans; WHO Summit Devolves Into U.S.-China Proxy Battle

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By South China Morning Post. US chip giant GlobalFoundries has halted operations at a joint venture factory in China, the company has confirmed, dealing a potential blow to China’s bid to own a bigger slice of the global semiconductor market.

The closure of the firm’s only China facility comes just three years after it announced plans to make chips in the mainland, and comes amid an escalating tech war with the United States.

The winding down, however, has little to do with the fierce superpower rivalry. It comes after two years of speculation as to what was actually happening at the US$100 million facility, which was hailed as “a miracle” by local media when announced to fanfare in 2017, but which never got off the ground.

Nonetheless, the symbolism is rich. China is struggling in its efforts to boost its domestic chip research and production in a bid to counter US efforts to block it from American technology. (Read more from “U.S. Semiconductor Giant Shuts China Factory Hailed as ‘a Miracle’, in Blow to Beijing’s Chip Plans” HERE)

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WHO Summit Devolves Into U.S.-China Proxy Battle

By Politico.The United States and China hijacked the annual meeting of the World Health Assembly, the World Health Organization’s governing body, part of an ongoing diplomatic battle over Covid-19 that has left a global leadership vacuum.

Chinese President Xi Jinping opened the summit in Geneva with an announcement of $2 billion in extra funding for the pandemic response. Less than 24 hours later, President Donald Trump countered in a letter to the World Health Organization, giving it 30 days to “commit to major substantive improvements” and threatening to permanently cease U.S. funding to the U.N. public health agency if it fails to do so.

The WHO has real questions to answer about its sluggish coronavirus response — it formally declared the outbreak a pandemic only in mid-March, after the virus was known to have spread to more than 100 countries.

But the dueling carrots and sticks approaches from Beijing and Washington overshadowed global consensus on that front: At least 144 countries co-sponsored a resolution for an independent global pandemic inquiry, and no countries objected to the resolution. (Read more from “WHO Summit Devolves Into U.S.-China Proxy Battle” HERE)

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Pentagon Sources Warn: U.S. ‘Would Lose a War With China’ in the Pacific, ‘Fears the Guam Military Base Is at Risk Now’; U.S. Increases Military Pressure on China

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By Daily Mail. The US would lose a war with China fought in the Pacific, is unable to defend Taiwan from an invasion and fears the Guam military base is at risk now, US defense sources have warned.

‘Eye-opening’ Pentagon war games have revealed growing fears the US is vulnerable to threats from China and that any attack would lead to the US ‘suffering capital losses’, the sources said.

The worrying analysis is expected to come to light in the Pentagon’s 2020 China military power report this summer.

The stark warning comes as tensions continue to mount between the two nations after US President Donald Trump has blasted China’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic and repeatedly suggested the nation lied about the extent of its crisis.

US defense sources told The Times that one Pentagon simulation based on the year 2030 when China would have new attack submarines, aircraft carriers and destroyers resulted in the US being overwhelmed by the nation’s force. (Read more from “Pentagon Sources Warn: U.S. ‘Would Lose a War With China’ in the Pacific, ‘Fears the Guam Military Base Is at Risk Now'” HERE)

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U.S. Increases Military Pressure on China as Tensions Rise Over Pandemic

By CNN. The US is upping military pressure on China amid increased tensions over the South China Sea and accusing Beijing of seeking to leverage the coronavirus pandemic to extend its sphere of influence in the region.

Over the last few weeks US Navy ships and Air Force B-1 bombers have undertaken missions aimed at sending a very public message that the US military intends to maintain a presence in the region and reassure allies.

It’s also a top priority for the Pentagon to get the virus-stricken aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt back out to sea in the region by as soon as the end of the month. (Read more from “U.S. Increases Military Pressure on China as Tensions Rise Over Pandemic” HERE)

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Trump Tweets an Ultimatum to the World Health Organization

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By The Blaze. President Donald Trump sent a letter to the World Health Organization laying out their failures in the response to the coronavirus pandemic, and giving them an ultimatum. . .

The letter accuses the WHO of downplaying the pandemic and echoing propaganda from the communist Chinese government.

“You also strongly praised China’s strict domestic travel restrictions, but were inexplicably against my closing of the United States border, or the ban, with respect to people coming from China,” the letter read.

“I put the ban in place regardless of your wishes. Your political gamesmanship on this issue was deadly, as other governments, relying on your comments, delaying imposing life-saving restrictions on travel to and from China,” the letter claimed.

The president says that unless the WHO makes substantive changes, the U.S. may leave the organization and take away its funding permanently. (Read more from “Trump Tweets an Ultimatum to the World Health Organization Over Coronavirus and China” HERE)

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Trump Threatens to Keep WHO Funding Freeze in Place After WH Investigation

By Fox News. . .The White House has insisted that Beijing downplayed the virus’ threat in December, which led to the subsequent outbreak. China has denied the charge.

Trump announced in April that the U.S. would halt funding to the organization. He said at the time that his administration would undertake a 60-to-90 day investigation into why the “China-centric” WHO had caused “so much death” by “severely mismanaging and covering up” the coronavirus’ spread, including by making the “disastrous” decision to oppose travel restrictions on China.

The U.S. was the WHO’s largest single donor. Trump said the United States contributes roughly $400 to $500 million per year to WHO, while China offers only about $40 million.

The WHO “consistently ignored credible reports of the virus” in December 2019. By the end of that month, it was clear at the organization that the virus was a “major health concern.” Taiwanese authorities told health officials at the organization about human-to-human transmission, but that revelation was not shared with the international community. . .

Dr. Rick Bright, a whistleblower who ran the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, blamed the Trump administration for its own slow response to the pandemic and said the administration was instead worried about politics instead of science. (Read more from “Trump Threatens to Keep WHO Funding Freeze in Place After WH Investigation” HERE)

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Chinese Ambassador to Israel Found Dead at Home; China Emerges as Potential Strain on U.S.-Israel Relationship

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By Fox News. China’s ambassador to Israel was found dead inside his home north of Tel Aviv on Sunday, the Israeli Foreign Ministry said.

Du Wei, 57, arrived in Israel in mid-February amid the coronavirus outbreak and was living in the coastal city of Herzliya on the outskirts of Tel Aviv. He previously served as China’s envoy to Ukraine.

Staff found Du unresponsive in his bed with no signs of violence to his body, the Haaretz daily reported. Initial media reports said Du’s cause of death appeared to be from a cardiac incident. (Read more from “Chinese Ambassador to Israel Found Dead at Home” HERE)

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China Emerges as Potential Strain on U.S.-Israel Relationship

By The Hill. Increasingly close ties between China and Israel risk straining the special relationship Israel has with the U.S., especially as Washington ramps up its feud with Beijing over the spread of the novel coronavirus pandemic.

The historic alliance narrowly avoided a diplomatic fallout this week with Israel relenting to U.S. concerns and delaying a Chinese infrastructure project in the country, coinciding with a whirlwind visit by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to Jerusalem.

While the U.S. has long expressed concern to Israel over its ties with China, Israeli officials have signaled they are not stepping back from relations with Beijing entirely.

Pompeo used his latest visit to highlight the risk of doing business with the Communist Party.

“We do not want the Chinese Communist Party to have access to Israeli infrastructure, Israeli communication systems, all of the things that put Israeli citizens at risk,” Pompeo said in an interview Thursday with an Israeli news channel, “and in turn put the capacity for America to work alongside Israel on important projects at risk as well.” (Read more from “China Emerges as Potential Strain on U.S.-Israel Relationship” HERE)

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WH Trade Adviser: China Deliberately Allowed Coronavirus to Spread Outside Its Borders; Navarro Ties Obama, Biden and China Together in Coronavirus Attack

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By Breitbart. During an interview broadcast on Friday’s edition of the Fox Business Network’s “WSJ at Large,” White House Trade Adviser Peter Navarro stated that China deliberately allowed the coronavirus to spread to the rest of the world and that the virus “could have been contained in Wuhan.”

Navarro said, “China hid the virus behind the shield of the World Health Organization, and that was a time, Gerry, when that virus could have been contained in Wuhan. Instead, what China did was put hundreds of thousands of Wuhanians and Chinese on planes that were allowed to go to Milan and New York and elsewhere, but not to Beijing and Shanghai.” (Read more from “WH Trade Adviser: China Deliberately Allowed Coronavirus to Spread Outside Its Borders” HERE)

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Navarro Ties Obama, Biden and China Together in Coronavirus Attack

By Politico. White House adviser Peter Navarro came out swinging against former President Barack Obama, former Vice President Joe Biden and China in a vigorous defense of the Trump administration’s handling of the coronavirus crisis.

On Sunday morning, Navarro started off by calling Obama’s administration a “kumbaya of incompetence.”

“I’m glad Mr. Obama has a new job as Joe Biden’s press secretary,” Navarro responded on ABC’s “This Week.” “As far as I’m concerned, his administration was a kumbaya of incompetence in which we saw millions of manufacturing jobs go off to China.” . . .

That statement led Navarro to his next target: Using the term “China virus,” he said it could have been contained in Wuhan, where it was thought to have originated. However, he said, the Chinese government intentionally hid information and sent its citizens to other countries to “seed” the virus. (Read more from “Navarro Ties Obama, Biden and China Together in Coronavirus Attack” HERE)

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