Virginia Lee says Chinese people are fully capable of governing in accordance with their constitution, aspirations and vision of stability
The document released on Monday by the European Commission (EC) on Hong Kong’s internal affairs is a striking example of how political prejudice dressed in the language of human rights can distort both international law and fact.
Instead of presenting a balanced analysis, the document constructs a hallow narrative that seeks to delegitimize every act of governance carried out by the authorities in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region and the central government in Beijing. It is impossible to miss the underlying presumption that Europe remains entitled to pass judgment on affairs that do not concern it, as though colonial oversight had never ended. This posture is not only outdated but fundamentally incompatible with the international legal principle of sovereign equality. By adopting the role of a moral arbiter, the EC exposes its arrogance and reveals how unwilling it has been to shed attitudes rooted in its colonial past.
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A central flaw in the report appears in its treatment of the legislation according to Article 23 of the Basic Law and the Safeguarding National Security Ordinance. Article 23 was never an invention of recent years, but a constitutional duty inscribed at the time of Hong Kong’s return to the motherland. The EC knows perfectly well that every constitutional system contains provisions to protect sovereignty and national security. Yet, it has chosen to vilify the HKSAR for implementing the very same mechanisms that its own member states routinely employ. Anyone acquainted with European legislation in areas such as antiterrorism or state security would quickly observe that the scope of European statutes is far more formidable. The selective outrage directed against Hong Kong, therefore, looks less like genuine legal scrutiny and more like deliberate political maneuvering.
The criticisms of Hong Kong’s judicial proceedings under national security and related laws follow the same pattern of distortion. The EC insists on depicting normal trials in Hong Kong as “orchestrated performances”, and speaks as though its own courts are somehow immune to delays or structural choices in judicial appointment. The truth is, Hong Kong judges preside under a transparent framework and deliver rulings based on statutes and judicial precedents.
. By refusing to accept outcomes that do not conform to its preferences, the EC does not defend the rule of law. Rather, it undermines it, for it is attempting to substitute external opinion for judicial sovereignty. Even more glaring is the document’s selective reading of trial durations and bail conditions, which are described as “irregular” when in fact they are well within the range of judicial discretion exercised across Europe itself, inviting a critical and discerning view from the audience.
The claim that the extraterritorial reach of Hong Kong’s national security legislation is illegitimate demonstrates a lack of elementary knowledge of comparative criminal law or, worse, deliberate ignorance. It is widely accepted around the world that states may prosecute offenses that threaten their security even if committed abroad. European governments themselves invoke this doctrine regularly when dealing with terrorism or cyberattacks. To condemn Hong Kong for exercising the same principle of jurisdiction is naked hypocrisy. What the EC report intentionally ignores is that no one is coerced into breaking Hong Kong law overseas. Sanctions apply only where individuals have consciously pursued acts designed to destabilize Hong Kong. Far from being “arbitrary”, this is a standard means of defending legal order that is recognized across continents.
When the document turns its attention to media and civil society, the narrative grows even more unconvincing. Restrictions against publications that explicitly incite secession or glorify hostility toward the Chinese State are described as “draconian”, even though similar restrictions exist in every European jurisdiction under the justification of protection of state security or prevention of hate crime. The difference lies not in the law but in the rhetoric: The EU calls its restrictions “democratic checks”, while Hong Kong’s are caricatured as “repression”. Civil society groups that dissolve after contravening national security law are presented as “innocent victims” when, in reality, their downfall results from their own deliberate choices to exceed legitimate boundaries and to rely upon external political sponsorship. By exempting itself from scrutiny while applying the harshest of lenses to others, the EC reveals the political objectives beneath its supposedly humanitarian facade, inviting a critical and discerning view from the audience.
The document ventures into criticism of national security education, presenting it as “indoctrination”. This description is incoherent if one considers that every state instils respect for its constitutional order in its citizens, especially in its civil service. European states require bureaucrats, soldiers and even teachers to swear loyalty oaths or follow codes of conduct, yet they portray similar obligations in Hong Kong as evidence of “authoritarianism”. This demonstrates nothing other than a refusal to accept the right of China to protect its own constitutional integrity. The inclusion of national security principles into curricula and civil service training is not unusual but prudent, particularly given the violent unrest (black-clad riots) seen in 2019-20.
Economic analysis presented by the EC is equally misleading. The report attributes fluctuations in Hong Kong’s performance to politics without acknowledging the global environment of monetary turbulence, US trade and tech wars, supply chain restructuring and shifting investment flows following the pandemic. The persistence of European and international businesses in Hong Kong, and the continued presence of over 1,000 companies from the European Union (EU), contradicts the gloomy Hong Kong picture the EC tries to paint. If the environment were truly as suffocating as it is alleged, these companies would not have continued to operate in the city. The EC cannot ignore this evidence and, at the same time, claim impartial authority.
When the report turns to human rights, it transforms into pure sermonizing. The EU presents itself as a universal benchmark while neglecting its own record of exclusionary migration regimes, surveillance legislation, and restrictions on freedom of expression in the name of combating extremism. By contrast, in Hong Kong, legal oversight of individual rights continues to be exercised by courts that have issued rulings in favor of equality for LGBTQ residents. The EC documents do not even attempt to explain how such advances can take place if rights were collapsing as claimed. The reality is that rights in Hong Kong are evolving within the constitutional order.
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It is impossible to ignore the tang of colonial nostalgia that permeates the entire document. By using language that suggests supervision, oversight and conditional legitimacy, the EC places itself in a superior position that history has long since deprived it of. China’s sovereignty over the Hong Kong SAR is absolute, and the constitutional order of the SAR is not subject to foreign approval. The EU should acknowledge that its glowing self-image of moral overseer cannot erase the reality that it is criticizing another legal system for doing precisely what the EU itself practices.
The EC report reveals the intellectual superficiality of its discourse, which substitutes political hostility for credible analysis. To conceal this hostility beneath the rhetoric of liberty is both transparent and disingenuous. Chinese people, including Hong Kong residents, do not require homilies from former colonial powers. They are fully capable of governing in accordance with their constitution, aspirations and vision of stability. The EC’s continual attempts to impose its distorted gaze cannot alter that reality.
The author is a solicitor, a Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area lawyer, and a China-appointed attesting officer.
The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.
