STUART LAU STUART.LAU@SCMP.COM
PUBLISHED : Tuesday, 02 December, 2014, 12:48pm
UPDATED : Tuesday, 02 December, 2014, 1:18pm
Richard Ottaway, chairman of the House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee, said it would not cancel plans to “hear from people in Hong Kong”. Photo: AFP
British lawmakers have postponed a trip to Hong Kong after Beijing barred the delegation over fears that the visit might send the “wrong signals” to Occupy Central demonstrators.
The uncooperative attitude of Beijing – with a deputy ambassador to the UK declaring a “100 per cent” chance of entry refusal for the eight MPs – has been questioned by British Prime Minister David Cameron, the US State Department and a former law dean of the University of Hong Kong.
The House of Commons will hold an emergency debate today on China’s ban. The House’s Foreign Affairs Select Committee said on its website yesterday that it “will postpone its visit to Hong Kong but will continue to take oral evidence, potentially including evidence by video link.”
It vowed to “proceed with its inquiry into the UK’s relations with Hong Kong, despite opposition by the Chinese government”.
The committee said that its chairman, Richard Ottaway, was informed by Ni Jian, China’s deputy ambassador to Britain, that the refusal of entry was related to the Occupy movement.
Ni was quoted as saying: “The committee’s delegation making a so-called inquiry and scrutinising Hong Kong may send the wrong signals to the figures of Occupy Central. Also, it shows some encouragement for illegal actions.”
When Ottaway asked Ni if the committee would not be allowed into Hong Kong, Ni replied: “100 per cent surely. You will not be allowed.”
Ottaway said that the committee would not be pressured by Beijing into abandoning the inquiry and said it would not cancel plans to “hear from people in Hong Kong”.
“The approach taken by China has been very revealing, and we shall be looking carefully at how the Foreign Office responds,” he said.
READ MORE: David Cameron steps into row over Beijing's refusal to allow lawmakers into Hong Kong
The Sino-British Joint Declaration signed in 1984 between London and Beijing set out the terms of Hong Kong’s return to Chinese sovereignty in 1997.
Ottaway told NHK that China’s response “amounts to saying the joint declaration is null and void” and might affect various negotiations Britain has with Beijing.
China’s Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying criticised Ottaway on Monday, saying that “if a particular member of parliament does not listen, this is what a confrontation is, and that is not in the interest of developing Sino-British relations.”
But Professor Johannes Chan Man-mun, the legal scholar at HKU, questioned Beijing’s move.
While China has the right to deny entry for any visitor to Hong Kong, he said Beijing’s action was “politically confrontational” and would “put China in a very bad light in the Western world”.
“China cannot brush aside the joint declaration as if it does not exist or has no legal effect,” Chan said.
“Under the joint declaration, China agreed with the UK that it would honour its promises on Hong Kong for 50 years from 1997. Thus, the UK has a contractual interest to ensure that such promises are carried out.
“The argument that political development in Hong Kong is an internal affair is not sound insofar as the UK is concerned, for it would not have been an issue in Hong Kong in the first place had it not been of the joint declaration to which the UK is a party.”
The United States on Monday issued a fresh appeal to Beijing to exercise restraint in Hong Kong, adding it was concerned that British MPs had been barred from visiting the territory.
“We hope the members of parliament will be able to travel freely, as they wish,” State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said.
Cameron’s spokesman said on Monday that Beijing’s decision was “mistaken” and “counter-productive” as it “only amplifies concerns, rather than diminishing them”. Britain would be seeking a dialogue over the issue, he added.
Due to the emergency meeting at the House of Commons, the select committee’s evidence session scheduled for today was postponed. Journalist Jonathan Fenby, the South China Morning Post‘s editor-in-chief from 1995 to 2000, was originally due to testify.
Duncan Innes-Ker, senior editor at the Economist Intelligence Unit and Dr Tim Pringle, a senior lecturer at the University of London’s School of Oriental and African Studies were also scheduled to give evidence today.
Additional reporting by Agence France-Presse
http://m.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/1653821/british-mps-postpone-hong-kong-trip-after-beijing-denies-entry
