Beijing unexpectedly postpones vote on adding anti-sanctions legislation to Hong Kong’s Basic Law
- The law, designed to punish companies that abide by US sanctions or fail to carry out China’s, has prompted anxiety among some foreign investors
- The National People’s Congress Standing Committee will ‘continue to study related issues’, city’s sole delegate to the body tells Post
China’s top legislative body has unexpectedly postponed a vote to introduce a far-reaching anti-sanctions law into Hong Kong’s mini-constitution that would give the city legal teeth to retaliate against Western government attacks.
While the business community is nervous about being caught in the crossfire after the city adopts the law, the sudden U-turn by the central government has raised eyebrows, coming just after Tam Yiu-chung, Hong Kong’s sole delegate to the National People’s Congress (NPC) Standing Committee, predicting earlier this week that the “urgent and necessary” resolution was very likely to be approved.
Explaining the unprecedented postponement, mainland Chinese sources said the central government “hopes to listen to further views on the matter” and “do more legal research”.
“The central government would like to garner more views from various sectors in Hong Kong in the hope of facilitating more mature discussion on the matter,” a mainland source familiar with the matter said.
Another official mainland source based in Hong Kong said the potential backlash among banks was one of the key factors for the postponement.
“Opinions diverged even at the last minute, including from some state-owned financial institutions on how to handle this best in Hong Kong. The central government therefore decided to be more prudent and not to rush,” the source said, while declining to estimate how much more time would be needed for the resolution to be tabled again.