Turning Chinese flag upside to be criminalised as Beijing moves to tighten legal protections
- New protections for national symbols will apply in Hong Kong and follow series of incidents during last year’s anti-government protests
- Localist lawmaker Cheng Chung-tai was fined in 2017 for overturning miniature flags during a Legislative Council debate
China has strengthened its national flag law to ban turning it upside down in an amendment that will also make it compulsory for government agencies in Hong Kong and Macau to fly it on working days.
The amendments to the National Flag Law will also criminalise the casual disposal of the flag.
The changes will apply in Hong Kong, where the flag law has been included as an annex to the Basic Law, the city’s mini-constitution, since 1997 when the city returned to Chinese rule.
The country’s top legislative body, the National People’s Congress Standing Committee, passed the amendments on Saturday after a second reading. The laws will be enacted next year.
No explanation has been given about what triggered the new clause that specifically criminalises turning the flag upside down.
However, in 2017 localist lawmaker Cheng Chung-tai was convicted of overturning miniature Chinese and Hong Kong flags during a debate in the Legislative Council the previous year and fined HK$5,000 (US$645).
Tam Yiu-chung, Hong Kong’s sole delegate on the National People’s Congress Standing Committee, said the city would be required to strengthen its existing laws against disrespecting the Chinese flag.