Now, Beijing has decided to introduce a national security law via Annex III of the city’s mini-constitution, the Basic Law, meaning the new law will be promulgated without the need for local legislation.
Hong Kong’s opposition politicians have said the plan to introduce the law by fiat is tantamount to adopting a “one country, one system” model in the city, abandoning the “one country, two systems” principle that guarantees it a high degree of autonomy.

The new law would require the Hong Kong government to set up new institutions to safeguard sovereignty and allow mainland agencies to operate in the city as needed.
In 2003, the Hong Kong government was forced to shelve a national security bill after an estimated half a million people took to the streets to oppose the legislation, amid fears it would curb their rights and freedoms.

The protest took place two days after a resolution to “prevent, frustrate and punish” threats to national security in Hong Kong was presented to China’s legislature. The draft legislation would outlaw acts of secession, subversion and terrorism.
The resolution is expected to be passed on May 28, authorising the NPC Standing Committee, the country’s top legislative body, to craft a tailor-made national security law and impose it on Hong Kong, bypassing the city’s legislature.
In a statement on Sunday night, the Hong Kong government said it strongly condemned rioters’ illegal acts and supported the resolute enforcement actions of police.
A spokesman said the fundamental objective of the central government’s decision to table the resolution was to safeguard national security and the prosperity and stability of Hong Kong, and to better protect the legitimate rights and freedoms of all people.
The violent acts showed that advocates of Hong Kong independence and rioters remained rampant, reinforcing the need and urgency of the legislation, he said.

After his arrest, more than 100 people gathered outside the store, chanting, “Hongkongers, revenge!” and “Hong Kong independence is the only way out!”
Earlier in the day, the police force urged citizens on its Facebook page not to take part in any unauthorised assemblies, saying it had mobilised enough officers to take decisive action and make arrests. Groups of riot police in full gear had begun gathering in locations near the department store before noon.

“There may be little we can do, but we still have to come out irrespective of the outcome,” he said.
Minutes before the first round of tear gas was fired, People Power activist Tam Tak-chi was arrested while conducting what he called a “health talk” outside Sogo, saying such gatherings were exempt from Covid-19 rules banning groups of more than eight people.
“This is a health talk and is exempt from the rules. We have nurses here,” he said. He went on to accuse local pro-Beijing figures of wanting to make Hong Kong like any other mainland Chinese city.
Police warned Tam he was conducting an unauthorised assembly before arresting him shortly thereafter.
“Fight for freedom! Stand with Hong Kong!” he chanted as he was taken away.

Student activist Joshua Wong Chi-fung, who was at the scene early on, said he planned to continue lobbying for support from other countries, even if that meant falling afoul of the looming national security law.
“When Beijing announced the law, it was time to fight back,” Wong said.
One protester who gave his name as Tang said he had observed more suppression by the Hong Kong government in the past two weeks, including the taking over of the Legislative Council’s key House Committee by pro-establishment lawmakers.

Police later said some protesters had vandalised shops in Causeway Bay, breaking their windows, while others had dug up bricks from the street.
An armoured vehicle and water cannon were deployed along Hennessy Road, with members of the police’s Special Tactical Squad on top of the armoured car pointing their weapons at surrounding crowds.
At Canal Road, the situation grew tense as police raised the blue flag ordering the public to disperse several times, warning off reporters and district councillors with threats to use pepper spray. The water cannon was later fired at protesters as they attempted to place barricades on the street, while more tear gas was used outside the Hysan Place shopping centre.

More protesters were arrested outside Sogo, and pepper balls were fired elsewhere in Causeway Bay later on.
Police issued a statement at 2pm saying “minimum necessary force, including tear gas” had been used, as protesters had thrown umbrellas and water bottles at them. Four officers from the police media liaison team were also said to be injured after protesters threw bricks and other items at them.
Hong Kong Law Society president Melissa Kaye Pang, meanwhile, said a lawyer had suffered serious injuries after being assaulted by a group of black-clad people in Causeway Bay. Pang, who expressed anger and sadness over the attack, said the lawyer had been sent to hospital.
Videos online showed the lawyer, 40, being kicked and struck with umbrellas. Police said they were searching for 10 male suspects, aged 20 to 40.

At 2pm, protesters occupied Gloucester Road, while others holding a banner reading “heaven will destroy the Chinese Communist Party” began marching towards Wan Chai. There were also displays of American flags. Others could be heard cursing at riot police, with some yelling, “Hong Kong independence. The only way.”
Police fired pepper balls at one group on Gloucester Road, where they later said that “rioters climbed over railings and dashed through a flyover and multiple carriageways in the vicinity, causing serious obstruction to road traffic” and “they also rampaged through passing vehicles, posing serious threat to public safety”.

Behind the store, a group of four clad in black was stopped and searched as protesters nearby chanted: “Liberate Hong Kong; revolution of our times.”
A 15-year-old secondary school student at the protest said social media posts had convinced him to “stay and fight” rather than move to another country over the legislation.
“When I first heard about Beijing’s plans to introduce the national security law, my desire to emigrate grew bigger,” he said. “But then I saw how many people were saying on social media that we need to come out and fight this law, so I decided I needed to stay and fight.”

During the Sunday clashes, police raised blue flags warning protesters converging outside the Sogo department store to disperse before tear gas was first fired near the junction of Hennessy Road and Percival Street at 1.24pm.

The law would have “no impact on Hong Kong’s high degree of autonomy, the rights and freedoms of Hong Kong residents, or the legitimate rights and interests of foreign investors in Hong Kong”, Wang said. “Instead of becoming unnecessarily worried, people should have more confidence in Hong Kong’s future. This will improve Hong Kong’s legal system and bring more stability, a stronger rule of law and a better business environment to Hong Kong.”

Ten people were admitted to hospital, including a 51-year-old woman in critical condition, the Hospital Authority said. The other nine were either in a stable condition or later discharged from hospital. The woman, reportedly a cleaner with underlying heart problems, had suffered a panic attack and collapsed as a group of people rushed into a toilet where she was.

The protests erupted just hours after Chinese Vice-Premier Han Zheng, Beijing’s top leader in charge of Hong Kong, told local delegates to the national legislature that Beijing’s determination to push through the national security law should not be underestimated, and that mainland authorities would “implement it till the end”.

At the ongoing National People’s Congress session in Beijing, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi sought to ease concerns about the new law, saying it would not damage the city’s autonomy or freedoms.
The proposed legislation was aimed only at a “very narrow category of acts that seriously jeopardise national security”, such as “treason, secession, sedition or subversion”, he said.

Police fired multiple rounds of tear gas in Hong Kong’s Causeway Bay shopping district on Sunday as thousands took to the streets to protest against Beijing’s planned national security law for the city, even as top Chinese officials sought to ease fears about its impact on local freedoms but remained stern about seeing it implemented.
Police said at least 180 people were arrested – mostly on suspicion of unauthorised assembly, unlawful assembly and disorderly conduct in a public place – in a crackdown as protesters spread out along streets of Causeway Bay and Wan Chai.
A water cannon truck was used and volleys of tear gas were fired in a series of confrontations as some radicals among the protesters defying the government’s coronavirus crowd restrictions blocked multiple roads, smashed traffic lights, lit small fires and hurled bricks dug up from pavements at police.
Some also vandalised shops, while at least two people objecting to the roadblocks were severely assaulted by black-clad groups.

Tear gas fired, arrests made as thousands protest against Beijing’s planned national security law for Hong Kong
Police say at least 180 people arrested in crackdown as protesters spread out along streets of Causeway Bay and Wan Chai
Top Chinese officials seek to ease fears about new law’s impact on local freedoms but remain stern about seeing it implemented

The CPI, which is the weighted price of a basket of goods in the world's second largest economy, rose 5.2 per cent in February, an eight-year high. The inflation rate has come down since then, to 3.3 per cent in April, as consumers cut back on spending in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, weakening price pressures

Over the course of the past few months, the official metrics of unemployment have ticked up. Surveyed unemployment rose to 6.0 per cent in April, up from 5.9 per cent in March and 5.2 per cent in December, while registered urban unemployment stood at 3.66 per cent in the first quarter of the year, up from 3.62 per cent at the end of last year.
But these metrics do not tell the full story. Neither indicator includes China's nearly 300 million migrant workforce, who move from job to job without a contract. In April, analysts at Zhongtai Securities estimated that there could be up to 70 million people to have lost their jobs during the virus, which would mean a real unemployment rate of more than 20 per cent.
Consumer inflation, meanwhile, soared over the second half of 2019 and early part of 2020, due in large part to pork shortages stemming from an African swine fever outbreak that led to the deaths of more than 100 million hogs through culling or disease

The virus initially shutdown large swathes of China's economy, damaging supply chains and China's exports. But it has now locked down many of China's major trading markets, meaning the economy is facing a second shock wave in disappearing demand for its products abroad.
At the National People’s Congress (NPC) last year, the government set a growth target range of between 6.0 and 6.5 per cent for 2019. Actual GDP growth came just within target range, at 6.1 per cent.
The International Monetary Fund predicted growth of 1.2 per cent for China's economy this year, following the coronavirus disruption. This would be a historic annual low, but is still higher than some private sector forecasts.
But after years in which GDP growth was the major economic target of the ruling Communist Party, focus in recent months has changed to jobs, amid growing concern about the rising levels of unemployment caused by the coronavirus.

The target for consumer price index (CPI) growth for the year is around 3.5 per cent, compared to 3 per cent last year.

Beijing has set a local special bond quota at 3.75 trillion yuan (US$527 billion), compared to 2.15 trillion yuan last year. It will issue 1 trillion yuan in special Treasury bonds, targeting a fiscal deficit ratio of 3.6 per cent, compared to 2.8 per cent last year. As the special Treasury bonds are not included in central government’s budget, they do not contribute to raising the deficit-to-gross domestic product (GDP) ratio.
“We must be clear that efforts to stabilise employment, ensure living standards, eliminate poverty, and prevent and defuse risks must be underpinned by economic growth; so ensuring stable economic performance is of crucial significance,” the work report continued.
“We need to pursue reform and opening up as a means to stabilise employment, ensure people’s well-being, stimulate consumption, energise the market, and achieve stable growth. We need to blaze a new path that enables us to respond effectively to shocks and sustain a positive growth cycle.”

The report also said China would focus on more stable and higher-quality imports and exports, and a basic equilibrium in the balance of payments
Growth in personal income that is basically in step with economic growth, elimination of poverty among all rural residents living below the current poverty line and in all poor counties, effective prevention and control of major financial risks and a further drop in energy consumption per unit of GDP and the discharge of major pollutants were also included.
“We will work harder to improve the composition of fiscal spending. We will see that spending on people’s basic well-being is only increased and not cut, ensure spending in key areas, and resolutely cut general expenditures.
“Construction of new government buildings and wasteful and excessive spending will be strictly prohibited. Governments at all levels must truly tighten their belt. The central government will take the lead by committing to negative growth in its budgetary spending, with a more than 50 per cent cut to outlays on non-essential and non-obligatory items.”

China GDP: Beijing abandons 2020 economic growth target, Premier Li Keqiang confirms at NPC
China will not set an economic growth target for 2020, Premier Li Keqiang confirmed at the National People’s Congress (NPC) on Friday in Beijing
China has set a target of creating 9 million new urban jobs, while the target for consumer price index (CPI) growth is around 3.5 per cent

China will not set an economic growth target for the first time in 2020, Premier Li Keqiang confirmed at the National People’s Congress on Friday in Beijing
The move was expected in some quarters, with the economy having contracted by 6.8 per cent in the first quarter of 2020 compared to a year earlier, under huge pressure from the coronavirus pandemic.
“We have not set the specific [gross domestic product] target mainly due to the global pandemic and big uncertainties in the economy and trade,” read the work report, adding that China was facing an “unpredictable” time.
China's government has, though, set a target of creating 9 million new urban jobs, compared to 11 million last year, and a surveyed urban unemployment rate of around 6 per cent, compared to 5.5 per cent last year. In 2019, China created 13.52 million new urban jobs.

Chinese officials have increasingly been under pressure to respond to unemployment, which threatens social stability. The unemployment rate jumped by 6.2 per cent in February, the highest on record, but independent analysts have said the numbers may be higher, and could reach 10 per cent this year.
Belt and Road Initiative
Li said China would focus on quality for “mutually beneficial outcomes” in its Belt and Road Initiative. Criticism has escalated over Beijing's lending practices in its billion-dollar development drive, which have left poorer countries out of pocket in the midst of the pandemic.
A number of African countries, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and others have requested delays and restructuring in billions of dollars of existing loans for major projects, raising concerns among Western countries in particular over Beijing's use of the initiative for its geopolitical ambitions.

Covid-19 challenges persist
Li said the Covid-19 pandemic had not yet come to an end, and that China faced an “immense” task in promoting development.
Li said China had given top priority to protecting people’s lives since the outbreak in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in December, and the country would strive to resume economic development and ensure employment while maintaining regular epidemic prevention and control measures.
The coronavirus has infected more than 5 million people and killed over 320,000 around the world, including 4,645 people in China.
Economic focus
The NPC comes as China continues its re-emergence from the health crisis, but amid widespread criticism of its initial handling of the outbreak and attempts to cover it up.
Some Chinese activists and scholars have even called for the meeting to be a reckoning of Beijing’s response to the pandemic, which has infected more than 5 million people and killed close to 330,000 around the world.
Those appeals are likely to go unanswered, however, as the nation’s leaders are expected to spend the next week or so expounding their policies and proposals for reviving the economy, alleviating poverty and fiscal reform.
Unemployment measures
Li stressed the need to increase jobs support, including for the country's 8.74 million college graduates this year, in the midst of soaring unemployment in China. The Covid-19 pandemic has left tens of millions without work. Several hundred million casual labourers and other low-income earners would be able to postpone their social insurance premiums and employment-related government fees, and the government would provide more vocational training, he said.

Tsai's administration has forcefully rejected the “one country, two systems” model of semi-autonomy proposed by Beijing for the island, and has refused to recognise the “1992 consensus”, a political understanding that Tsai's predecessor claimed meant there was only one China, but different interpretations of whether Taipei or Beijing ruled.
Li’s remarks echoed those made in last year’s work report, but left off mention of the “1992 consensus” which was included last year.

Taiwan slams national security legislation for Hong Kong
Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council slammed the proposed national security law for Hong Kong, saying it violated the democratic and human rights of the city's people. It said the legislation would increase dissatisfaction and endanger all people in the city, as well as its status as an international financial centre.
“In a reflection of the CCP's inability to self-reflect, it is blindly ignoring the root of Hong Kong’s instability and blaming it instead on external forces and ‘Hong Kong independence’ forces, and is therefore anxious to legislate to be on guard against any national security loopholes,” the council said in a statement.
“The laws of any civilised country should be the protector of the people, not the shackles of freedom,” it said. “We hope the relevant parties will think twice, and not make the wrong decision, to plunge Hong Kong into further chaos."

Earlier this month, US President Donald Trump threatened to terminate the phase one trade deal, if China failed to fulfil its promise of buying US goods. Many have speculated about China's capability to keep up with that promise after the pandemic.
Foreign investment
China will “significantly shorten” its negative list for foreign investment as trade tensions with Washington continue, over issues such as market access.
Without referencing specific sectors, Li said the government would draw up a negative list of areas in cross-border trade in services, in which foreigners may not participate. He said, however, that Beijing would seek to ensure a market environment which would allow "all companies, Chinese and foreign, to be treated as equals and engage in fair competition”.
Rejection of separatist activities in Taiwan
Li called in his address for the resolute rejection of separatist activities seeking Taiwan's independence, and urged a deepening of ties across the Taiwan Strait towards the goal of peaceful reunification.
His comments came just after Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen's official inauguration for her second term on Wednesday as leader of the democratic island. Beijing has said it will not renounce the use of force to assert its claims of sovereignty.

Sharp fall for Hong Kong markets
Hong Kong’s stocks fell sharply on Friday after Beijing said it plans to pass a security law to curb secession and sedition in the city. The Hang Seng Index slid 2.6 per cent, or 619.47 points, to 23,660.56 right after the open.
The resolution expected later today will add to the confrontation between Beijing and Washington, with US President Donald Trump saying his administration would respond strongly.
“A horrible risk for markets is that much of the attention from today's NPC will turn to Hong Kong. The agenda includes an item that would mean the government will tighten its grip over the special administrative region, which could potentially reignite the protests that wracked the city last year,” said Stephen Innes, a strategist at AxiCorp.
“But even more worrisome is the global backlash, especially with the US-China hawks circling overhead. A denouncement by the White House, which is almost certainly to happen, could exacerbate already tenuous US-China relations and could trigger a global backlash that Trump seems to be pinning his hopes on. Indeed, it is starting to look like a US-China summer of discontent in the making.”
Phase one China-US trade deal to continue
Li vowed the phase one trade deal with the US would be implemented from January. “We need to implement the phase one trade deal with the US,” he said, adding that China was committed to a multilateral trade system and reform of the World Trade Organisation. He also said China would push forward with the China-Japan-South Korea Free Trade Agreement.
According to the phase one deal signed with the US, China pledged to buy, over two years, at least US$200 billion more in American goods and services than it did in 2017, including about US$40 billion in agricultural goods.

Hong Kong security ‘a national matter’
An editorial published by official state newspaper People's Daily at midnight on Friday said the building of a fully functioning legal and implementable framework for Hong Kong's national security was “a national matter instead of just a Hong Kong matter”.
“The fact is, Hong Kong has been handed over for nearly 23 years but local legislation [on national security law] has been delayed without progress. Anti-China radicals have used this period of time to frequently challenge the authority of the central government, promoted and encouraged ‘independence’, secession and sedition activities,” the article said.
“In 2019, protests roiled from the anti-extradition bill even showed that anti-China radicals are repeatedly stepping on the bottom line of the security of national sovereignty, challenging central authority and authority of the Hong Kong Basic Law. Violence erupted and riots emerged.
“This has seriously threatened the practice of ‘one country, two systems’ and the prosperity and stability of Hong Kong. These are all testimonies of how building a fully functioning legal and implementable framework in Hong Kong is necessary and urgent,” the article said.

National security resolution today
The central government will table a resolution today to enable the NPC Standing Committee to craft and pass a new national security law tailor-made for Hong Kong.
Sources earlier told the Post the new law would proscribe secessionist and subversive activity as well as foreign interference and terrorism in the city, which have been pressing issues over the past year of anti-government protests in the city.

Sources said Beijing believed it was impossible for the city’s Legislative Council to pass a national security law to enact Article 23 of the city’s Basic Law given the political climate. This was why it was turning to the NPC to take on the responsibility.
The Basic Law, or the city’s mini-constitution, requires the Hong Kong government to enact its own national security law prohibiting acts of “treason, secession, sedition, or subversion” under Article 23.
But the law has been in abeyance since 1997. In 2003, the Hong Kong government was forced to shelve a national security bill after an estimated half a million people took to the streets in July that year to oppose the legislation which they said would curb their rights and freedoms.

The government said it would maintain the current tax cut measures to year end. The full-year tax cut for corporations is expected to cut their tax burden by more than 2.5 trillion yuan this year alone, according to the report. Last year’s tax cut saved corporations and individuals 2.3 trillion yuan.
Hong Kong legal system
In the government work report, Li said the central government would “accurately” implement the “one country, two systems” and the principle of “the Hong Kong people governing Hong Kong”.
It also said a sound legal system and enforcement mechanism for safeguarding national security in the Hong Kong special administrative region should be established

The principle of “Hong Kong people governing Hong Kong” was omitted in the report by Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference chairman Wang Yang on Thursday.

The government will issue one trillion yuan in new “special treasury bonds” this year – the first issuance of such bonds since 2007. The issuance size is at the lower end of expectations.
Beijing has set the local government special bond quota for this year at 3.75 trillion yuan (US$527 billion), compared to 2.15 trillion yuan last year.

around 6 per cent, compared to 5.5 per cent last year. A CPI target was set at 3.5 per cent, versus 3 per cent last year. According to the government’s work report, a new target for urban job creation was set at 9 million, versus 11 million last year.

Beijing set a central government budget deficit target of 3.6 per cent of GDP this year, up from 2.8 per cent last year, giving it more room to increase spending to combat the damage caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

Beijing said it always keeps military spending below 2 per cent of its annual GDP. However, China’s official figures have long been criticised as lacking transparency with significant omissions of important items. The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) estimated the actual expenditure on defence in 2019 was US$261 billion, rather than the announced 1.19 trillion yuan (US$178 billion).
No GDP target
China set no specific growth target for 2020, for the first time in history. “We do not set the specific GDP target mainly due to the global pandemic and big uncertainties about the economy and trade. China is facing unpredictable factors in its development,” Li said in the report.

However, the rate of increase this year is the lowest in 20 years. It came after the 6.8 per cent shrinkage in GDP in the first quarter of 2020 – the first contraction since quarterly records began in 1992 – after an extensive shutdown to contain the coronavirus outbreak.

Two Sessions 2020: China increases defence spending by 6.6 per cent but sets no GDP target, focuses on Hong Kong national security law
China’s top leaders come together for condensed version of annual meeting after two-month delay because of the Covid-19 pandemic
Government’s plans for reviving the economy, alleviating poverty and fiscal reform top the agenda

Beijing has announced an increase of 6.6 per cent in its military spending, but did not set a target for gross domestic product (GDP) growth for 2020 as the National People’s Congress, China’s most important annual political event, got under way in Beijing on Friday.
Premier Li Keqiang said a sound legal system and enforcement mechanism for safeguarding national security in Hong Kong should be established and separatist activities seeking Taiwan’s independence should be resolutely rejected.
Delayed for about two months because of the global health crisis, this year’s congress is expected to be several days shorter than usual. The thousands of deputies taking part were all tested for the coronavirus and isolated ahead of the event, while most of the interactions between deputies and reporters are expected to take place online.
With reporters in Beijing and across the country, the South China Morning Post will provide comprehensive daily coverage of NPC 2020, starting with Li’s opening address.
Defence spending
China has increased its military budget to 1.27 trillion yuan for 2020, a 6.6 per cent rise from last year despite the economic decline in the first quarter of the year, the country’s top legislative body revealed on Friday.

This year’s growth in defence spending marked a continuous expansion over two decades in the 21st century. The number has boomed over 12 times from 107.6 billion yuan in 1999.

"to fast track Coronavirus production"... poor choice of words!

XmenOrigin,Hong Kong should’ve treated the two as a package. It’s not a pick and choose game. The message behind rejecting 23, and pushing 22 is concerning to any country. Those who promote the idea of saying no to 23 should honestly ask themselves: do you really want to be in China?

I strongly believe Xi and TRUMP are keeping tabs with each other to reach a compromise with both hoping to get political benefits out of it. My opinion is that this law is aimed at the Legco elections since things are getting out of hand for the pro-est. camp. They did themselves no favours in handing 5.4 billion to Ocean Park which can only let them survive for another year. Voters will be thinking how much of our reserves will be funneled to vested interests if the pro-est. camp retains a majority. Vultures are swooping overhead to get a slice of our money and the current government is burning money whilst not lifting a finger to help ordinary civilians.
On the new law, as long as it isnt retroactive we have to accept it whether we like it or not but if it is retroactive and candidates are disqualified from participating in the elections it is as clear as crystal on the real intentions of this new law.

gooddaymate,You haven't learned anything in 5,000 years.
America has done in 250 years what China has never done.
And American might will be what subjugates Chinese CCP

XmenOrigin, What do you call denying Taiwan entry to the WHO or playing in the Olympics by it's own name or how it treats those who even mention Taiwan separate from China. China is a bully.

QuellingBlaster
MO1 paid USD1.5m from his own pocket? Off cause not. No paper trial or is UD1.5m too small a figure to be ignored? Probably the then PH government has paid too much attention on RM2.6b!

wah makan sendiri ka?

PAS is supporting Najib' s UMNO who are quietly working with Isrealis. It is a slap on Hadi's face as he has been condenming Isreal. UMNO is only interested in power and money. PAS projects itself as one working for Islam but sleeps with UMNO who work with enemies of Islam.

Democracy without rule of law like citizens destroying both private & public properties including paralyzing the state economy and social fabric is Anarchy and Hong Kong is approaching toward that 'failed state' much sooner than expected