Chinese state media are having a field day exploiting the riots that have occurred in recent days in Minneapolis and other cities across the United States led by a coordinated cadre of left wing radicals. These violent extremists have sought to hijack the peaceful protests by many well-meaning people outraged by the killing of an unarmed African-American, George Floyd, by a rogue ex-policeman. Chinese propagandists lump the peaceful protesters and the smaller number of dangerously violent rioters together as if they were part of one indistinguishable movement, in the same way as the ruling Chinese Communist Party treats all the protesters in Hong Kong.
Hu Xijin, the editor-in-chief of Chinese and English editions of the Chinese Communist Party-controlled Global Times, tweeted sarcastically, for example, “Secretary Pompeo, please stand with the angry people of Minneapolis, just like you did with people of Hong Kong.” Then, in a tweet aimed at President Trump after the president vowed to use force as necessary to deal with the violent riots, Xijin wrote: “Just three days after unrest broke out in Minnesota, Trump threatened the use of ‘shooting’ and announced the army supports the governor. I strongly condemn such threats. Please protect the people of Minnesota, just like you sympathize with Hong Kong thugs.”
News flash for Hu Xijin: President Trump and his administration are committed to protecting the American people’s right to conduct peaceful demonstrations while also protecting the lives and properties of innocent people from wanton acts of violence. The Chinese communist regime suppresses all dissent on the mainland, which it intends to do in Hong Kong.
“We have peaceful protesters and support the rights for peaceful protesters,” President Trump said on Friday. He agrees with the demonstrators that the brutal killing of George Floyd at the hands of the rogue ex-policeman, Derek Michael Chauvin, was inexcusable. On Saturday, President Trump called George Floyd’s death “a grave tragedy” that “has filled Americans all over the country with horror, anger, and grief.”
The video image of Chauvin kneeling on Floyd’s neck for more than eight minutes as Floyd was lying helpless on the ground has sickened Americans of all races and backgrounds. The president said that he had spoken to George Floyd’s family and “expressed the sorrow of our entire nation for their loss.”
Chauvin was arrested Friday in Minneapolis on charges of third-degree murder and manslaughter. More serious charges may follow. Other police officers who stood by and did nothing are likely to face charges as well. The Department of Justice and FBI are investigating as a top priority the circumstances of the killing for possible federal prosecutions in the case.
Peaceful protests are as American as apple pie. However, when anger turns from peaceful protest to violence that harms innocent people, including African-Americans who have seen their places of business destroyed, the Trump administration has drawn a bright line. “We support the right of peaceful protestors (sic) and we hear their pleas,” President Trump said, “ but what we are now seeing on the streets of our cities has nothing to do with justice or with peace. The memory of George Floyd is being dishonored by rioters, looters and anarchists.” The president placed the blame for the violence on “Antifa and other radical left wing groups who are terrorizing the innocent, destroying jobs, hurting businesses and burning down buildings.”
The Chinese government and their Hong Kong police stooges make no distinctions between peaceful protesters and violent rioters. All the Hong Kong protesters, including young people peacefully holding signs, are lumped together by the Hong Kong police and their masters in Beijing as one monolithic mob of “thugs” and “terrorists.”
On May 28th, the People’s Republic of China National People’s Congress approved a resolution to devise and arbitrarily impose national security legislation on Hong Kong that would override Hong Kong’s Basic Law. As the Chinese government proceeds with drafting and implementation of such detailed legislation giving the Chinese state security agencies a green light to intervene directly against protesters in Hong Kong, the Tiananmen Square Massacre comes to mind.
On June 4, 1989, Chinese soldiers and police stormed Tiananmen Square, firing live rounds into a crowd led by students calling for democracy, free speech and a free press in China. Numerous protesters were killed, and thousands were reportedly arrested. The regime justified the Tiananmen crackdown as necessary to maintain stability and described its enforcers as heroes.
One of the protesters at Tiananmen Square who survived the brutal crackdown was none other than today’s prominent mouthpiece for Chinese government repression, Hu Xijin. Back in the day, Xijin “chanted slogans, joined in renditions of protest anthems like ‘L’Internationale’ and grew excited as he heard American radio broadcasts declare that democracy might come to China,” Todayonline reported. A year ago, by contrast, Xijin’s Chinese Communist Party-controlled newspaper editorialized, “As a vaccination for the Chinese society, the Tiananmen incident will greatly increase China’s immunity against any major political turmoil in the future.” Now Xijin uses Twitter and his Communist Party-controlled media perch to push back against any critics of the regime’s plans to smother the remaining freedoms of the people of Hong Kong.
The Chinese “broke their word to the world on ensuring the autonomy of Hong Kong,” President Trump said on Friday. He announced new measures against Chinese interests and the removal of various policy exemptions that have given Hong Kong preferential treatment so long as it remains sufficiently autonomous from mainland China’s communist regime to warrant such preferences. “China has replaced its promised formula of ‘one country, two systems’ with “one country, one system,” President Trump said. The “one system” is the Chinese Communist Party’s dictatorship model – the repressive system that the dictatorship’s propagandist Hu Xijin rebelled against as a student at Tiananmen Square 31 years ago.
China’s United Nations Ambassador Zhang Jun strongly condemned efforts by the United States and the United Kingdom to convene a formal meeting of the UN Security Council last week to discuss China’s plans to assume direct control over Hong Kong’s security. “Hong Kong affairs are purely China’s internal affairs and allow no external interference,” Ambassador Zhang said.
China’s UN ambassador is wrong. The Chinese government’s plans to assume direct control over Hong Kong’s security without a free and fair vote by the Hong Kong people themselves violates Beijing’s obligations in the Sino-British Joint Declaration of 1984 and explicit provisions of Hong Kong’s Basic Law. The Joint Declaration is deposited with the United Nations as a formal treaty. The United Kingdom handed over to China jurisdiction of Hong Kong in 1997. It did so in reliance on China’s legally binding commitment under international law to respect the autonomy of the city and its residents for 50 years. The United States has provided Hong Kong with preferences in reliance on China’s adherence to its treaty obligations. The Chinese communist regime has evidently decided that 2047 is too long to wait before stripping the Hong Kong people of their freedoms.
On Sunday, the former Tiananmen Square protester-turned-Chinese communist regime mouthpiece, Hu Xijin, tweeted, “Vicious HK rioters obviously are mastermind of violent protests across the US.” Why isn’t Twitter as anxious to slap warning labels on Xijin’s scurrilous disinformation in his tweets as it is doing with President Trump’s perfectly legitimate tweets?
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