Hong Kong's duty to speak up
In the past few weeks, I have met visitors from Europe and the US who are concerned about human rights in China. Besides monitoring the situation in the mainland, they are interested in developments in Hong Kong.
On January 27, I met the chairman of the Prague-based Olympic Watch, Jan Ruml, who is a former vice-president of the Czech Senate. Olympic Watch - also called the Committee for the 2008 Olympic Games in a Free and Democratic Country - was set up in 2001 in response to the International Olympic Committee's decision to grant the Games to Beijing. It was originally the idea of three former Czech dissidents, including Mr Ruml. The committee now consists of 13 people from six countries, mainly former senior parliamentarians or government officials.
Olympic Watch intends to link violations of human rights in China with universal Olympic ideals. The aim is to demonstrate that the lack of freedom of expression, the widespread use of the death penalty and torture, and denying people their other rights and liberties is in direct contradiction of the Olympic ideals of 'human dignity' and 'harmonious development of man'. In exposing the fallacies of Chinese propaganda, Olympic Watch hopes to keep the international community better informed and to create greater space for the Chinese democratic movement to flourish.
I told Mr Ruml that Hong Kong is still the freest city in China, and can contribute to the political development of the mainland as long as we remain free, with the rule of law intact. Six years ago, Beijing signed the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights - but has yet to ratify it. By ratifying and implementing the covenant it would be a clear signal that it is serious about making progress in human rights and democracy.
Nevertheless, the mainland government allowed Hong Kong to continue to be a party to the covenant following the change of sovereignty in 1997. Hong Kong's periodic report to the UN Human Rights Committee on its implementation of the covenant was due in October 2003. It is still not ready. The Legislative Council's home affairs panel will ask the administration why it has taken so long.
I also met Jared Genser, president of Freedom Now, a Washington-based organisation dedicated to freeing prisoners of conscience through legal, political and public relations advocacy efforts. Mr Genser has represented Yang Jianli , a scholar and democracy activist who fled China in the aftermath of the Tiananmen massacre in 1989, but was arrested when he returned to the mainland more than three years ago. Yang was convicted of spying and illegally entering the country, and was sentenced at a closed trial to five years in prison. American inquiries about his health and the prospects for medical parole have been ignored.
Mr Genser said that Yang's treatment was one example of a much wider, systematic failure of the US government's human rights dialogue with China. To be more effective, he said, Washington should work with other countries to secure human rights commitments from China as a condition for future loans from the World Bank.
The issue of human rights violations in China is ultra-sensitive, even in relatively free Hong Kong. Since human rights are universal values and transcend national and regional boundaries, it is paramount that people in the special administrative region pay more attention to these disturbing developments in the mainland, and make our voices heard. The ability to comment on the situation in the mainland is a measure of the freedoms that Hong Kong people enjoy. Ultimately, the guarantee for a free and democratic Hong Kong is a free and democratic China.
Emily Lau Wai-hing is a legislative councillor for The Frontier
