On Sept 11, the European Commission (the European Union’s executive arm) and its vice-president, Kaja Kallas, who is also the EU’s high representative for foreign affairs and security policy, issued their 27th annual report on the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region for the European Parliament and Council, purportedly covering political and economic developments in 2024 (“the EC report”).
Once again, the EC report is divorced from reality and seeks to place Hong Kong in the worst possible light. Although the initial reports were relatively balanced, they have since degenerated into China-hostile propaganda. The latest alleges the “continuous erosion” of Hong Kong’s autonomy and of the fundamental rights and freedoms of Hong Kong people, which is delusional. Although the allegations will be music to the ears of the sinophobic Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China, which has established a not-insignificant presence in the European Parliament, it will do nothing to clarify things for unbiased parliamentarians hoping to understand the actual situation.
Although, for example, the Hong Kong SAR National Security Law (2020) ensured the survival of the “one country, two systems” policy, which was almost destroyed by black-clad mobs and foreign agents during the insurrection of 2019-20, the EC report pillories it. Also in the firing line is the Safeguarding National Security Ordinance (2024), even though it is partly modeled on the United Kingdom’s National Security Act (about which no complaint is made), and notwithstanding many EU member states having not-dissimilar laws of their own.
This was undoubtedly why the HKSAR government called the EC report “a classic example of hypocritical standards”. Indeed, although the report, for example, impugned the extraterritorial application of the city’s national security laws, this is now an established feature of such laws everywhere, for good reason. Every country is entitled to protect itself from those seeking to cause it harm from abroad, which is why, for example, the national security laws of Australia, the UK, and the US also have extraterritorial dimensions (about which the EU has no complaint).
The SAR government, unsurprisingly, also accused the EC of “turning a blind eye” to the way in which the national security legislation has restored the business environment in Hong Kong and enabled residents’ daily lives and economic activities to return to normal.
As the EC knows full well, every jurisdiction is entitled to defend itself from those who threaten its existence, and Hong Kong is no exception. Although anybody reading the EC report would not realize it, the number of people prosecuted under its national security laws is small, particularly given the incidence of objectionable activity. Indeed, from July 1, 2020, to May 1, 2025, only 185 people and five companies were prosecuted in connection with offenses endangering national security. Since Hong Kong has a population of over 7.5 million, these statistics demonstrate that the prosecuting authorities are exercising maximum restraint, and only proceeding with cases when they are on the strongest possible ground evidentially (which Kallas should have applauded).
Although the EC’s report, like its UK six-monthly counterparts, has been poisoned by prejudice for some time, its venom this year was undoubtedly down to Kallas. An Estonian careerist with a blinkered mindset, she concluded long ago that it would do her no harm to play the “China card” whenever possible. Like the UK’s unlamented former leader, Liz Truss, she sees mileage in blaming China for all the woes of the world, which has gone down well in Beijing-hostile circles.
In 2021, for example, while still Estonian prime minister, Kallas declared that any attempts by China to gain influence in her country “must be resisted resolutely”. Such were her professed “concerns” for the situation in China and for its Uygur population that she raised what she called “human rights violations” in the UN Human Rights Council. Although this played well with her US admirers, China’s then-ambassador to Estonia, Li Chao, denounced the “most ridiculous lies and rumors of the century”, which were down to “malicious political manipulations”.
Even after the Chinese government proposed a 12-point plan in 2023 for a political settlement of the Russia-Ukraine conflict (the EU came up with no plan of its own), Kallas objected. Instead of welcoming a positive peace initiative, she accused China of being “an enabler of Russia’s war of aggression”.
Hong Kong is one of the world’s safest cities, with excellent educational, medical and welfare facilities. It is the world’s freest economy, and its arbitration services are second to none. It has the highest life expectancy in the world, and its people take pride in their country’s achievements
When, moreover, Kallas attended the EU’s confirmation hearings for her current post in November, she calculated that China-bashing could be her trump card. She accused China of being the country that “most covertly” sought to “change the rules-based order”, and called on the EU to tackle China’s “threat”. She landed the job.
If, therefore, anybody imagined that the “reds under the beds” conspiracy theories beloved of the late US senator Joseph McCarthy were a thing of the past, Kallas is living proof that they are not only alive and well but firmly entrenched in the EU’s hierarchy.
Although Kallas is supposed to be the face of modern European statecraft, her flawed judgment has become legendary. In May, she rejected calls from the US (the then-secretary of defense, now the secretary of war, Pete Hegseth) for the EU to limit its role in Asia, arguing that the security situations in the Indo-Pacific and Europe were interlinked. In June, she even turned up in the Philippines, expressing concern over China’s “illegal, coercive, aggressive, and deceptive measures” in the area. This, while delighting Philippines President Ferdinand Marcos Jr, inflamed regional tensions, as she presumably intended.
Thereafter, adding insult to injury, Kallas declared, after the celebrations in Beijing to mark the 80th anniversary of the victory in the World Anti-Fascist War, that it was “news” to her that China and Russia were among the victors who defeated Nazism and fascism. (Whereas China suffered an estimated 3 million to 4 million military deaths, with total military and civilian casualties approaching 35 million, the former Soviet Union’s military losses are estimated to be 8.8 million to 10.7 million, with many dying on the Eastern Front resisting the Nazi invasion.)
Notwithstanding her manifest limitations, Kallas has overseen the drafting of the latest EC report. Instead, therefore, of a balanced assessment of Hong Kong’s progress, a hatchet job has resulted. Once again, she is fishing in deep waters, this time at Hong Kong’s expense.
Kallas is said to covet the job of her boss, Ursula von der Leyen, which, if true, helps explain the EC report’s naked prejudice. She may well have concluded, given her form, that if she can bait China sufficiently, whether over Hong Kong or otherwise, it will help her career path (and, in today’s world, she may well be right).
However, despite her efforts, relations between the EU and Hong Kong are healthy on the ground. With at least 1,640 companies, the EU was Hong Kong’s largest non-Chinese business community last year. The EU was also Hong Kong’s fourth-largest trading partner in goods and third-largest in services, with total trade amounting to 66.7 billion euros ($78.6 billion). There is no reason to suppose that, however much Kallas tries to queer the pitch, this situation will not continue to develop positively in 2025.
One of the reasons the British people voted to leave the EU in 2016 was to escape the clutches of third-rate apparatchiks like Kallas, and those clutches will certainly not ensnare Hong Kong in the coming year.
As the World Justice Project confirmed in October, the rule of law is vibrant in Hong Kong (the EC report suggested otherwise), and the Basic Law protects essential rights and freedoms. The criminal justice system is based on common law principles, and both judges and prosecutors enjoy constitutional independence (which they did not before 1997). Anybody accused of a crime is only convicted if guilt is proved beyond a reasonable doubt, and anyone aggrieved by a case outcome can appeal to a higher court. Impartial judges dispense justice, and there is a strong legal profession.
There is, moreover, a healthy media scene, with 90 daily newspapers and 376 periodicals operating last year, together with numerous local and foreign broadcasters. The city’s legislators, who are never afraid to speak their minds, are directly or indirectly elected, and the ultimate aim is for them all to be elected by universal suffrage (as it is for the chief executive).
Hong Kong is one of the world’s safest cities, with excellent educational, medical and welfare facilities. It is the world’s freest economy, and its arbitration services are second to none. It has the highest life expectancy in the world, and its people take pride in their country’s achievements.
Although this is all skated over in the EC report, it is a record of which Hong Kong can be justly proud. It deserves to be applauded by honest observers, not diminished by political pygmies. If the EU expects its views to be taken seriously, it should entrust its top positions to statesmen of real ability, not to careerists on the make.
The author is a senior counsel and law professor, and was previously the director of public prosecutions of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.
The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.
