PUBLISHED : Tuesday, 02 September, 2014, 11:29am
UPDATED : Tuesday, 02 September, 2014, 2:33pm
Beijing has accused UK lawmakers of meddling in Hong Kong’s affairs. Photo: SCMP
The head of a British parliamentary inquiry into Hong Kong said that China appears to have breached the terms of the Sino-British Joint Declaration when it ruled out the possibility of genuine democracy in the city on Sunday.
But lawmaker Richard Ottaway admitted that the UK was in a “weak” position to sanction China for breaching the agreement reached 30 years ago between the UK and China over the return of Hong Kong to Chinese sovereignty.
Ottaway’s comments came as it emerged that China has tried to block the inquiry, announced in July, accusing British lawmakers of “highly inappropriate” interference in China’s “internal affairs”.
The Foreign Affairs Committee of China's National People's Congress wrote to its UK counterpart warning it to drop the inquiry, while the Chinese ambassador to UK also discouraged elected members of the British parliament [MPs] from taking part, the BBC reported.
The letter advised MPs to “bear in mind the larger picture of China-UK relations”.
British lawmakers are examining the implementation of the Joint Declaration, which states that Hong Kong should have a high degree of autonomy and executive power, and that personal rights in the territory must be enshrined by law.
The Chinese committee’s letter said it vowed to “brook no interference, either directly or indirectly, from the UK or any other external forces”, the BBC said.
On Sunday the central government set out a restrictive framework for Hong Kong’s chief executive election in 2017 – the first ever by universal suffrage – which effectively ruled out the possibility of real democracy in the territory.
Beijing says it must control which two or three candidates stand in the election via a nominating committee in order to safeguard national security. Sunday’s decision led to protests throughout the city, with pro-democracy leaders announcing the start of an “era of civil disobedience”.
British MP Ottaway, the chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee carrying out the inquiry, said that it appeared that China breached the Sino-British agreement with Sunday’s decision.
“The Basic Law which flows out of the Joint Declaration did call for universal suffrage in the election of the chief executive and if you have a committee that is not neutral and is nominating a limited number of candidates, there seems to be a prima facie case that the undertakings given have been breached,” Ottaway told the BBC.
The Conservative lawmaker brushed off China’s efforts to block the inquiry, insisting it will continue and had not reached any conclusions.
However, Ottaway admitted that Britain was in a weak position to sanction China if it had breached the agreement.
“As far as sanctions are concerned, frankly we are in a fairly weak position. Indeed, we were in a very weak position right from the beginning when this declaration was signed,” Ottaway admitted.
In July, British Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg said Britain would honour its 1984 pledge to “mobilise the international community and pursue every legal and other avenue available” if China breached the agreement which set out the “one country, two systems” policy.
Ottaway said Britain should set out “the standards and norms that we in Britain think are important and that will of course influence the way we conduct our relations with China.
“If China hasn’t complied with its undertakings, what is the Foreign Office doing about it?” he added.
“I think this is a right and proper procedure. I don’t particularly want to irritate the Chinese. I want them to understand the procedure. It may well be that my committee will decide that actually the Chinese have behaved perfectly reasonably.”
The committee previously stated that Britain “retains an enduring commitment to Hong Kong following the transfer of sovereignty in 1997”.
British lawmakers are planning to visit Hong Kong as part of the inquiry.
http://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/1583535/beijing-slams-uk-plan-hold-inquiry-hong-kongs-political-situation
