The Guardian’s Jonathan Watts on staving off China’s environmental apocalypse

Posted: March 8th, 2011 | Tags: , , , , , , , | No Comments »

Courtesy of Bert van Dijk from Flickr
Late on in The Matrix film, there is a scene when Hugo Weaving’s Agent Smith theorises to the captured Morpheus that humans are a disease, a “cancer of this planet”. This is a tad much for Jonathan Watts, Asia environmental correspondent for the Guardian newspaper. He downgrades us to locusts instead. Read the rest of this entry »


Google’s withdrawal presents tricky balancing act for Hong Kong

Posted: March 26th, 2010 | Tags: , , , , , , | No Comments »

Google’s decision to back out of China and no longer kowtow to the government has been rightly applauded around the world. But the company’s actions have brought into sharp relief the political balancing act that Hong Kong now faces. Google’s move now threatens to marginalise Hong Kong and accelerate its assimilation into China.

Hong Kong is something of an enigma to China. Reunited after Beijing regained sovereignty in 1997, the two possess cultures that at times can be as disparate as those between the East and West. Besides the language difference, Hong Kong is unlike any of China’s other major economic centres in that it possesses rule of law, strong press freedoms and an uncensored internet. It is the only place where politicians and people can openly discuss the events of Tiananmen in 1989 and Falun Gong, the repressed spiritual movement whose practitioners frequently demonstrate in Hong Kong’s tourist spots.

Values that once helped draw Western praise and investment are the cause of much hand wringing in Hong Kong. It is the city state’s respect for freedom of information that represents a direct challenge to authorities in Beijing. Google’s retreat has highlighted Hong Kong as a paradox, a place within China’s domain that lies beyond the government’s reach and control. But increasingly reliant on favourable policies from Beijing, the Hong Kong government must now convince the Chinese leadership it will not become a hub for subversion. Simultaneously, it must not cede the autonomy accorded to it in the ‘one country, two systems’ approach.

The two have clashed in the past. In 2003 the Hong Kong government tried to pass anti-subversion legislation that critics feared would outlaw free speech and criticism of the mainland. The laws were widely viewed as an attempt to appease Beijing but withdrawn after 500,000 protestors marched on Hong Kong island. Since then, China has regarded Hong Kong warily and stymied efforts for further political reform. Pro-democracy campaigners are fighting to bring forward Beijing’s timetable for universal suffrage. At present, Hong Kong’s seven million people will be able to directly elect their chief executive in 2017 and their lawmakers in 2020. But campaigners want to see elections take place in 2012 which caused ire on the mainland.

Government officials now speak openly of establishing Shanghai as China’s financial capital and Hong Kongers fear this will extinguish their home’s unique role as gateway into the country. BusinessWeek reported that when Hong Kong’s chief executive Donald Tsang visited Beijing earlier this month, he was told Shanghai had surpassed Hong Kong’s economic output for the first time in almost 30 years.

Almost exactly a year ago, China’s Foreign Ministry spokesman made an ominous remark about his country’s attitude towards the internet. “Many people have a false impression that the Chinese government fears the internet,” Qin Gang said. “In fact it is just the opposite.” This ruthlessness could be wielded against Hong Kong if further insubordination is to come.