Beijing tells Britain it has no ‘moral responsibility’ for Hong Kong

Beijing has dismissed the notion that Britain has any moral responsibility for Hong Kong after 1997, shortly after a top Chinese diplomat claimed the Joint Declaration that settled the city's future was already "void".

The war of words has continued after Beijing blocked a delegation of British lawmakers from entering the former colony.

Asked whether Britain still had any responsibility for the city as a signatory to the agreement, Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said that was not the case.

"Britain has no sovereignty over Hong Kong that has returned to China, no authority and no right to oversight. There is no such thing as a moral responsibility," she said yesterday. "The real aim of a small minority of British people trying to use so-called moral responsibility to obscure the facts is to interfere in China's internal affairs. [This] cannot succeed, and is something China certainly cannot accept."

The British parliament held a three-hour emergency debate on Tuesday over the ban, with MPs warning it would damage ties between London and Beijing.

China and Britain signed the Sino-British Joint Declaration in 1984, setting out the terms of Hong Kong's return to Chinese sovereignty in 1997. After the treaty was signed, it was registered at the United Nations by the Chinese and British governments on June 12, 1985.