China’s attempt to stamp out pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong is taking an ominous turn, with local military officials raising the specter of a brutal crackdown.
“The incidents have seriously threatened the life and safety of Hong Kong citizens and violated the bottom line of ‘one country, two systems,’” Chen Daoxiang, the commander of China’s military garrison in Hong Kong, said Thursday. “This should not be tolerated, and we express our strong condemnation.”
Chen’s call for Hong Kong’s judiciary “to punish those violent criminals” who have been demonstrating for democracy was his first public statement on the political crisis that has gripped the former British colony this summer. It coincided with the release of a propaganda video that shows Chinese military forces firing weapons in an urban setting and rounding up protesters.
“All consequences are at your own risk,” a soldier shouts, per a translation accompanying the video.
The warning drew condemnation from Taiwan, the last holdout of the government overthrown during the Chinese Communist revolution of 1949, which the Communist Party regards as a renegade province rather than an independent country.
“Beijing is celebrating Armed Forces Day in a most uncivilized fashion,” Taiwan’s ministry of foreign affairs tweeted. “The people of Hong Kong are gifted a video of vile threats! The PLA is supposed to protect the people, not pound them into submission. It’s time for authoritarian China to back off!”
Beijing is celebrating Armed Forces Day in a most uncivilized fashion. The people of #HongKong are gifted a video of vile threats! The PLA is supposed to protect the people, not pound them into submission. It’s time for authoritarian China to back off! JW https://t.co/L2q4PCblSd pic.twitter.com/PJ0nqG3xLJ
— 外交部 Ministry of Foreign Affairs, ROC (Taiwan) ?? (@MOFA_Taiwan) August 1, 2019
That Taiwanese rebuke highlights the underlying tensions that make the crisis in Hong Kong such a sensitive issue for Communist officials. Chinese President Xi Jinping wants Taiwan to acknowledge the mainland government’s sovereignty and agree to a “one country, two systems” model of the sort that has allowed Hong Kong to flourish as a free-market economy in the decades since the United Kingdom relinquished the territory to Beijing.
“The Chinese are worried about how this will … result in the people in Taiwan just never being willing to consider ‘one country, two systems,’” Bonnie Glaser, a China expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told the Washington Examiner.
The garrison commander’s comments and the propaganda video expand on a warning from China’s defense ministry that the military could be called to put down the protests if necessary. The police have been increasingly violent in their dealings with demonstrators. Beijing has paired its threats with accusations that the United States is responsible for the protests, in which millions of people have taken to the streets to denounce a bill that would allow Chinese authorities to take custody of Hong Kong residents accused of a crime on the mainland.
“I think the protests are solely the responsibility of the people of Hong Kong, and I think they are the ones that are demanding that their government listen to them and hear their voices,” Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said earlier this week in response to the accusations. “It’s ludicrous on its face.”
