HONG KONG: Thousands of people attended a pro-Beijing rally in Hong Kong Sunday in support of China’s decision to effectively bar two pro-independence legislators from taking office, as fears grow of the city’s freedoms being under threat.
Beijing’s ruling last week preempted a decision by the Hong Kong courts over whether lawmakers Baggio Leung and Yau Wai-ching should be disqualified from Parliament after deliberately misreading their oaths of office, inserting expletives and draping themselves with “Hong Kong is not China” flags.
Beijing’s interpretation of the city’s constitution issued on Monday said that any oath taker who does not follow the prescribed wording of the oath, “or takes the oath in a manner which is not sincere or not solemn,” should be disqualified.
On Sunday rowdy crowds, waving Chinese flags, surrounded the government’s headquarters in a show of support for Beijing’s unprecedented decision, slammed by pro-democracy activists and legal experts as a massive blow to Hong Kong’s judicial independence.
Supporters chanted slogans such as “fight against Hong Kong independence, support the interpretation” at the rally, which was attended by pro-Beijing legislators.
“The cancer cells are those who are promoting Hong Kong independence... we will fight them to the end,” lawmaker Michael Tien told the crowd who cheered loudly in response. “China will never, ever tolerate the splitting of the nation,” Tien said.
Priscilla Leung, another pro-China legislator who attended the rally, said the lawmakers’ behavior at the swearing-in ceremony “humiliated all of the Chinese people.” Police said that 28,500 people attended the rally.
The Hong Kong High Court’s decision into whether Leung and Yau should be disqualified is still pending.
Hong Kong was handed back to China by Britain in 1997 under a “one country, two systems” deal which protects its freedoms for 50 years, but there are growing concerns those liberties are disappearing.
Thousands attend pro-Beijing rally in Hong Kong
Thousands attend pro-Beijing rally in Hong Kong
North Korea accuses South of another drone incursion
- The North Korean military tracked a drone “moving northwards” over the South Korean border county of Ganghwa
- South Korea said it had no record of the flight
SEOUL: North Korea accused the South on Saturday of flying another spy drone over its territory this month, a claim that Seoul denied.
The North Korean military tracked a drone “moving northwards” over the South Korean border county of Ganghwa in early January before shooting it down near the North Korean city of Kaesong, a spokesperson said in a statement carried by the state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).
“Surveillance equipment was installed” on the drone and analysis of the wreckage showed it had stored footage of the North’s “important targets” including border areas, the spokesperson said.
Photos of the alleged drone released by KCNA showed the wreckage of a winged craft lying on the ground next to a collection of grey and blue components it said included cameras.
South Korea said it had no record of the flight, and Defense Minister Ahn Gyu-back said the drone in the photos was “not a model operated by our military.”
The office of South Korean President Lee Jae Myung said a national security meeting would be held on Saturday to discuss the matter.
Lee had ordered a “swift and rigorous investigation” by a joint military-police investigative team, his office said in a later statement.
On the possibility that civilians operated the drone, Lee said: “if true, it is a serious crime that threatens peace on the Korean Peninsula and national security.”
Located northwest of Seoul, Ganghwa County is one of the closest South Korean territories to North Korea.
KCNA also released aerial images of Kaesong that it said were taken by the drone.
They were “clear evidence” that the aircraft had “intruded into (our) airspace for the purpose of surveillance and reconnaissance,” Pyongyang’s military spokesperson said.
They added that the incursion was similar to one in September when the South flew drones near its border city of Paju.
Seoul would be forced to “pay a dear price for their unpardonable hysteria” if such flights continued, the spokesperson said.
South Korea is already investigating alleged drone flights over the North in late 2024 ordered by then-President Yoon Suk Yeol. Seoul’s military has not confirmed those flights.
Prosecutors have indicted Yoon on charges that he acted illegally in ordering them, hoping to provoke a response from Pyongyang and use it as a pretext for his short-lived bid to impose martial law.
- Cheap, commercial drone -
Flight-path data showed the latest drone was flying in square patterns over Kaesong before it was shot down, KCNA said.
But experts said the cheap, commercially available model was unlikely to have come from Seoul’s armed forces.
“The South Korean military already has drones capable of transmitting high-resolution live feeds,” said Hong Min, an analyst at the Korea Institute for National Unification.
“Using an outdated drone that requires physical retrieval of a memory card, simply to film factory rooftops clearly visible on satellite imagery, does not hold up from a military planning perspective.”
