Lawrence Ma says the outgoing diplomat’s vilification of the SAR’s law enforcement actions conveniently ignore the extreme measures taken in the US

Gregory May, before leaving his post as the US Consul General for Hong Kong and Macao, made slanderous remarks about Hong Kong. He called Jimmy Lai Chee-ying and other suspects of national security violations “political prisoners”; and he depicted the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region’s legislative and law enforcement actions as “repression” when they were aimed at ending the chaos, restoring social order and protecting innocent people from the life-threatening violent acts perpetrated by “black-clad” rioters during the 2019-20 riots — acts that included setting fire to a bystander, killing an elderly passerby with a flying brick and  destroying property worth tens of millions of Hong Kong dollars in wanton vandalism.

While vilifying Hong Kong, May — who is reportedly taking up a leading role at the US embassy in Beijing — conveniently ignored the fact that the United States administration, under President Donald Trump, has employed various strategies to suppress protesters — particularly those opposing his policies or organized by groups he perceives as political adversaries. These measures have often involved militarized responses, legal maneuvers, and rhetoric aimed at delegitimizing dissent. The deployment of National Guard troops and active-duty military personnel to cities experiencing protests has frequently been seen under Trump.  In response to the Black Lives Matter protests in Washington, DC, Trump —during his first term in office — instructed governors to “dominate the streets” and threatened to unleash the military. More recently, during immigration protests in Los Angeles, Trump deployed thousands of National Guard troops and marines, bypassing objections from California’s governor. Trump has frequently referred to protesters as “violent mobs” or “paid insurrectionists”, framing peaceful demonstrations as threats to national security. A fair-minded person would definitely be upset by the US government’s treatment of protesters, but May did not seem to be bothered when he made hypocritical comments about Hong Kong’s handling of the 2019-20 “black-clad” rioters and their masterminds.

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Contrary to May’s claims, Lai did not just “express political views” but flew to the US, met then-US vice president Mike Pence and persuaded him to sanction China, which the US government did. Many HKSAR office holders and lawyers have been included in the US’ sanction list. Lai’s words counted, and his demands were met by Washington. He did not simply express his disagreement or a few harmless ideas, nor did he put forward any constructive proposals on how to improve the country in which he lives, works and makes his money; instead, he took concrete steps and spearheaded campaigns to undermine the country. Let’s not forget the newspaper he owned — the now-defunct Apple Daily —was a “must-read” for the “black-clad” rioters, subversive legislators, and political radicals. Thanks to repeated disinformation and biased narratives vilifying the central and HKSAR governments day after day for at least 25 years from 1995 to 2021, many Hong Kong residents were misled and ultimately turned into foot soldiers during the anti-China forces’ proxy war against the HKSAR government in 2019-20 — ignoring the fact that they were being manipulated by the local subversives and their external patrons to overthrow the HKSAR government and thereby disrupt China’s rise. Lai is not as “innocent” as May wants people to believe.

When regurgitating the words “peaceful expression of their political views”, May must have been referring to Benny Tai Yiu-ting, the “Hong Kong 47” case, and Joshua Wong Chi-fung.

Tai, the mastermind of all major subversive plots, including the “Occupy Central” campaign in 2014 lied to worried participants in the plan that resulted in the “Hong Kong 47” case that they would not be breaking the Hong Kong SAR National Security Law — so they were all jeopardizing their future by taking part in an illegal plot designed to take down the HKSAR government.

Tai made it unambiguously clear that once his handpicked candidates got elected to the Legislative Council, if his “five demands” not met by the HKSAR government, he would endeavor to trigger the dissolution of the Legislative Council, forcing the chief executive to resign and thus triggering a political crisis in the city. Yes, there is a mechanism built into the Basic Law to prevent a political crisis; but having this last resort mechanism does not mean that people should be free to bring about a crisis to devastate Hong Kong. These “Hong Kong 47” participants were the frontline fighters in Tai’s insidious political plot.

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Wong is even worse. The Western anti-China forces promoted him as the poster boy for the anti-China campaign in Hong Kong, glorying him on the cover of Time magazine, and capitalizing on his student image to deceive gullible young people into becoming inadvertent participants in a “color revolution”. Wong’s rabble-rousing remarks targeting young people did more harm to Hong Kong society in a sense — by poisoning many young people’s minds.  

May was trying to downplay the evil in them and wanted to deceive the international community into believing that they are just ordinary people who are in jail “for peaceful expression of political views”.

The author is a barrister and chairman of the Hong Kong Legal Exchange Foundation.

The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.