Hong Kong Jolted by China Threat to Block Move Toward Democracy

In recent days, Hong Kong has been jolted by a warning that China will try to stop the development of a democratic form of government in the British colony during the transition period before it reverts to Chinese rule in 1997.

China’s senior representative in Hong Kong, Xu Jiatun, told a press conference last week that his government does not want to see any “radical changes” in this East Asian financial center over the next 12 years. He indicated that current efforts to develop an elected legislature in Hong Kong could have what he called “damaging effects.”

To some Hong Kong residents, Xu’s remarks brought back unsettling memories of the gloomy days in the early 1980s when fears about the effects of future Communist control of Hong Kong produced a tumble in the stock market, a flight of capital and talk of mass emigration from the colony.

Xu is the director of the New China News Agency’s branch in Hong Kong and China’s main spokesman in the colony.

Under an agreement signed by China and Britain last year, the British agreed to return Hong Kong to Chinese sovereignty in 1997. In return, China agreed to let Hong Kong maintain its capitalist economic system, its civil liberties and “a high degree of autonomy” for 50 years after the changeover.

The 1984 agreement also provides specifically for an elected legislature in Hong Kong under Chinese rule. Until this year, Hong Kong’s legislative council was composed exclusively of British civil servants and Hong Kong residents appointed by the British governor.

But in September, the British permitted the first small step toward representative government by allowing indirect elections for 24 of the 56 members of the legislative council. British officials said they were considering direct elections and perhaps the development of political parties.

It is this process of increasing democratization that China now apparently is seeking to deter.