01-04-2025
US imposes sanctions on Chinese and Hong Kong officials for pursuing activists abroad
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Hong Kong's Secretary for Justice Paul Lam and Police Commissioner Raymond Siu were also among the six officials within national security bodies and the police force who were sanctioned for their roles in 'coercing, arresting, detaining, or imprisoning' individuals under the national security law.
In a national security crackdown since widespread unrest rocked the city in 2019, Hong Kong authorities have jailed scores of opposition lawmakers, activists, and others, including journalists, in the city.
The state department also released an annual report Monday, saying the Hong Kong government had continued to use its broad national security laws to undermine human rights and civil liberties in Hong Kong, a criticism other Western countries have also made. It noted that, as recently as December, the Hong Kong government had offered bounties for information leading to the arrests of dissidents living overseas.
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Hong Kong activists in the United States welcomed the move.
'Many of us have endured relentless pressure and threats through transnational repression. It truly means a great deal to see the US taking the lead in holding accountable the officials who orchestrated these actions,' Frances Hui, who was granted political asylum in the US, said in a statement on behalf of the Committee for Freedom in Hong Kong Foundation in Washington. Family members of overseas activists, including Hui, have been questioned in Hong Kong by its national security police.
The Chinese Embassy in Washington said in a statement that its enforcement of these laws, which were first imposed in 2020 in the aftermath of months of mass pro-democracy protests the year before, were "just and necessary" to return stability and prosperity to the Chinese territory. It also condemned the sanctions, calling it a "gross interference in China's internal affairs and Hong Kong affairs."
The Hong Kong government described the sanctions as 'despicable behavior' and acts of intimidation that 'clearly exposed the US's barbarity.'
The state department's sanctions place restrictions on property ownership and financial dealings of the individuals in the United States. The US has already sanctioned dozens of other Chinese and Hong Kong senior officials, issuing travel bans and directives to freeze assets imposed in 2020 and 2021.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio, long an outspoken critic of China's human rights record, said that Monday's actions demonstrated the Trump administration's commitment to hold to account those responsible for restricting freedoms of people in Hong Kong and pursuing those based overseas.
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Willy Wo-Lap Lam, a senior Fellow at The Jamestown Foundation in Washington, noted that while the sanctions were consistent with Rubio's stance toward China, President Trump himself has not publicly placed much emphasis on supporting human rights in the region. The Trump administration has drastically cut funds to organizations that have long given a voice to dissident communities in China and other countries, including Voice of America and Radio Free Asia.
'Trump himself doesn't have that much of an interest in what's happening in Tibet, in Xinjiang, and in Hong Kong,' Lam said. 'But it's just another card to play in the long-standing systemic competition with China.'
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