Regina Ip Claims Hongkong Migrants are "Refugees"

A person holds up their BN(O) passport during a mall protest

 

On Sunday 5pm Hong Kong time, the UK opened its doors to applications for the new British National (Overseas) immigration scheme.

This morning the British visa centre in North Point was a bit busier than usual, with many young families, some young people, and seniors.

One young couple said the process was quite smooth, as they had applied online and then at the visa centre provided fingerprints and facial scans, all completed in 30 minutes.

After five years HKers can apply for citzenship

The pro-establishment politicians, particularly one executive councillor, are doing their best to try to make the immigration scheme seem like a bad deal, but offering nothing better in return.

Exo member and lawmaker Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee said Britain was essentially treating Hongkongers hoping to move there as "refugees".

"You can go by simply paying for the visa and National Health Service fees and answering 100 questions. They are more or less treating you as refugees," she told a Monday morning radio program.

While she admitted Beijing and Hong Kong not recognizing BN(O) passports would not affect local residents much, but Ip hinted there were other countermeasures that could be taken, such as revoking the right of abode of permanent residents who resided in Britain.

She believed those who had left or were applying were either unhappy with the national security law, or had taken part in the 2019 anti-government protests and were afraid of being arrested.

Ip also suggested Hongkongers who emigrated under the new scheme might have "no skills and qualifications", unlike professionals like doctors, who could emigrate into the country via traditional methods.

Ip says the UK treats HKers like "refugees"

First of all has she not been reading the media reports that bankers and other highly qualified professionals are applying for this BN(O) immigration scheme? Is she insinuating the people who are leaving are all riff raff?

And second, she was part of the government over 20 years ago. As a member of the Tung Chee-hwa administration, she is partly responsible for the education of many of the people who are leaving. 

Third, many of the people sold their flats to move, which means they had pretty good-paying jobs to be able to buy property in the first place, in other words, they have a good education.

But she makes herself and Beijing sound elitist and condescending. And in a way the Hongkongers who are leaving want no part of that anyway.

Why not let people leave Hong Kong if they want? They obviously don't feel happy or safe here.

Former Democratic Party lawmaker Emily Lau Wai-hing has this exact sentiment.

Lau (left) says HKers should leave if they want

"It is none of their business [if Hongkongers choose to leave the city]," Lau said. "If Hong Kong residents feel they are safe, peaceful and free, do you believe they will, for no reason, sell their property and move overseas?"

The British government is forecasting up to 1 million people from Hong Kong emigrating to the UK in the next five years, though some say it could only be 320,000.

Many people have been thinking about leaving Hong Kong for a long time, at least a year or two. They have been carefully calculating how they can survive financially for at least six months without a job, and are psychologically prepared to take much lower jobs than their experience.

This shows their willingness to move for their children, or to feel happier or safer in another country.

What is Hong Kong doing to entice them to stay?

Nothing, which is why these people feel they have nothing to lose by going elsewhere.

 

Review: Coronation by Ai Weiwei

Ai Weiwei's documentary is about the pandemic in Wuhan

 

Let's face it -- 2020 has been completely shot -- thanks to the coronavirus pandemic and we still haven't tamed the virus thanks to people in parts of the world refusing to wear masks, or governments that didn't take it seriously in the beginning.

Over 1.29 million people have died since the pandemic began December 1, 2019, when the first case emerged in Wuhan, China.

Since then it spread to over 200 countries and now there are over 52.3 million cases.

Ai and his team edited 500 hours of footage

Artist and activist Ai Weiwei documented what happened in Wuhan with the help of intrepid volunteers who managed to get unprecedented access into hospitals to record first hand what was happening on the ground months after the pandemic gripped the Chinese city.

Called Coronation, the almost two-hour documentary is a series of vignettes and interviews with Wuhan citizens who had to come to grips with the reality of the virus and the decisions local and central governments made.

I saw the documentary last night with my friend YTSL, and also in the audience was former chief secretary Anson Chan Fong On-sang, Eric Wishart of the Foreign Correspondents' Club, and lawyer and author Antony Dapiran. We were in good company.

The opening image of Coronation is stark, viewers overlooking the high-speed rail lines in Wuhan that were paralyzed by the virus, completely empty, and the dreariness of the city. Three videographers record themselves driving back to the city and encounter a lot of police checks and frozen gas pumps.

A nurse helps an elderly patient with Covid-19

There are scenes in hospital patient rooms, watching an elderly patient in critical condition because one of the machines he is hooked up to is malfunctioning, others have faces as white as a sheet and are gasping for breath while breathing in oxygen. 

One gets access to the construction site of Huoshenshan Hospital, the emergency field hospital that was built within days to house 1,000 patients. Once it's completed, one of the doctors goes inside to report to work and he walks and walks along corridors until finally he reaches his locker.

Then there is the tedious task of putting on layers of personal protective equipment. He grabs a rubber glove with air in it to make sure there are no holes before putting it on. Very smart. Another person writes with a felt tip marker on his hazmat suit that he is a doctor and what his name is.

No wonder doctors couldn't go to the bathroom with all that stuff on.

A construction worker talks to his niece

Taking the PPE off too was another routine carefully monitored by someone in another room, instructing him what to do to avoid getting the virus on his own clothes and skin. Talk about an intense and stressful procedure.

One wishes the doctor would talk to the camera, but perhaps he was too hungry, as we watch him eat. Maybe we are already lucky to have such close access that we shouldn't demand much more.

However there are other stories, like the construction worker who helped build the hospital but is stranded in Wuhan and can't get out. He is stuck living in his car and charges his phone in a car park. He calls his young niece who reminds him to disinfect himself before they see each other.

It's light moments like these that keep Coronation not too sombre.

Perhaps one of the funniest vignettes is when a videographer stays with his mother, who is a die-hard revolutionary. She insists as long as you do what you are told, you will be looked after and shows off she has won many awards. 

Her son eggs her on to show them to him and she gathers a stack of red fabric books and dumps them unceremoniously on the table. There are certificates too that are rolled up like scrolls, though one is ripped and he jokes it's because it has Lin Biao's name on it.

A videographer (right) with his mother

Then there are people angry at the government regulations for not allowing them to be with their loved ones before they passed. This was not just happening in Wuhan, but around the world. Here, people openly complain in front of the camera, telling the world that they could not say good bye, or hold their hand as they lay dying.

One middle-aged son believed the government when it said there was no proof of human-to-human spreading of the virus and brought his elderly father back to Wuhan. He was soon infected and died; his son regretful, but wishes to do his duty to give his father a proper burial.

However, his father's danwei, or work unit refuses to allow him to retrieve his father's ashes alone; he must be accompanied by minders and he is adamant that this not happen. The danwei people realize they have not handled this carefully, but at the same time the son knows they are only doing their job, but he respectfully insists that he must not be accompanied by strangers who did not know his father at all.

The government tries to "disinfect" Wuhan

It's like a cat-and-mouse game that must have been infuriating for the son to deal with, let alone his regrets and mourning. He says that the government is so big there is no way one person can beat the system.

In a way Coronation is a warning for Hong Kong. We may laugh at the ridiculousness of the bureaucracy mainlanders have to deal with, but the reality is that Hongkongers will have to face this in real life very soon. In fact things are changing so fast that it is happening now, with Beijing destroying the veneer of "one country, two systems".

The mainlanders deal with authoritarian rule everyday, and some in the film know very clearly what is going on, others blindly following along. For some the pandemic has revealed the authorities' inability to humanize the situation, that everything is for the good of the state, even though it insists it is ruled by the people.

Coronation was remotely directed by Ai; the access the videographers got was impressive, though at times the camera is blurry and there are no second takes. It is a gritty film, though not as well produced as his previous work, Human Flow, about the refugees from Syria, Lebanon and Iraq who make their way to Europe.

Nevertheless, Coronation is an excellent record of what it was like in Wuhan, something the Chinese government cannot completely whitewash.

Coronation

Directed by Ai Weiwei

1hr 53 minutes

Review: Central Airport THF

Ibrahim Al Hussein (left) and Qutaiba Nafer (right) are refugees in Berlin

Thursday was World Refugee Day and I should have posted this review of a documentary I saw on the plane back to Hong Kong.

It's called Central Airport THF (Zentralflughafen THF in German) and it was released last year. When refugees first arrive in Berlin, they are processed and live at Tempelhof Airport, and the documentary follows an 18-year-old Syrian teen Ibrahim Al Hussein and aspiring doctor Qutaiba Nafer from Iraq.



The airport was originally commissioned by Adolf Hitler and opened in 1923 and it was supposed to be the world's biggest airport. But it wasn't quite big enough and closed in 2008. However since 2015 it is a temporary home to thousands of refugees who want to have a new life in Germany.

The film follows them through most of the year, with Ibrahim narrating most of the time. We follow him through his daily rituals, eating in the canteen that he says serves terrible food, learning German, running outside, and smoking. Lots of smoking.

The refugees live in cubicles with open ceilings in a hangar

Meanwhile Qutaiba volunteers his services as a translator to help medical staff process the refugees in terms of their healthcare needs. He is fluent in English and we see him helping not only translate but empathizing with the refugees, and even acting as a psychologist to two boys, asking them to draw out their memories of their homelands.

The pacing is slow -- but it's a deliberate move by filmmaker Karim Ainouz to show how life in the hangars can be, that the wait for refugees to be processed can take a long time especially when there isn't much for you to do.

Everyone lives in a small space with an open ceiling that has very basic beds and no "door", except for a sheet. A couple with children complains about this, but they are told the sheet is fireproof for their safety. They have no choice but to get used to this arrangement.

Ibrahim talks about whatever memories he has left of his home in northern Syria, his family. He wants to try to remember them as much as he can, and recalls his most terrifying night when he got onto a boat and didn't know if he would still be alive the next day.

They try to find ways to pass the time everyday

This contrasts with the predictable, safe, relatively clean and monotonous life he lives in the hangar, though he has a few friends (smokers) who he hangs out with. At Christmas, there's a party complete with several Santa Clauses and presents for the children, but Ibrahim scoffs the party is hardly festive and that it's for the kids, not for people his age.

On New Year's Eve, fireworks are set off, though for Ibrahim and probably many of the refugees, the sounds remind them of bombs and shooting...

What's also bizarre is that near the hangars for the refugees are large spaces for Berliners to ride Segways, bicycles or even do beekeeping. At night security men in a car spot several foxes in the area who aren't scared of humans.

Director Karim Ainouz wanted to humanize the refugee plight

Nevertheless, viewers take a liking to Ibrahim and want to root for him. He is a thoughtful teen, and anxious to get on with his life. It's hard to imagine what it's like to be by himself day after day, being far from his family and Syria, and trying to integrate into this new country, but Central Airport THF gives a good idea.

Central Airport THF (2018)
Directed by Karim Ainouz
1hr 40 mins

Two Hongkongers Are Refugees in Germany

Ray Wong (left) and Alan Li (right) at the German Parliament in Berlin

Yesterday it was reported two pro-independence activists involved with the localist group Hong Kong Indigenous have been granted asylum in Germany. The Hong Kong government has yet to react to the news.

That's because Ray Wong Toi-yeung and Alan Li Tung-sing were facing criminal charges for their alleged role in the Mongkok riot in 2016, and they fled Hong Kong in November 2017 before their trial. They were granted refugee status in Germany last May.

Police detain Wong (second left) during the Mongkok riots

The German Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (BAMF) said it received two asylum applications from Hong Kong in 2017.

According to Germany policy, the government would have to consider whether the pair faced persecution back home based on their political opinion or a disproportionate or discriminatory judicial proceeding when granting them asylum and subsequently a settlement permit equivalent to citizenship.
 
Wong, 25, said he decided to go public with his asylum status because the Hong Kong government was trying to push ahead with the extradition bill, which would allow the transfer of criminal suspects to mainland China, a law that some critics fear could be used for political purposes.

He and Li, 27, will speak at the German Parliament on June 4, the 30th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square crackdown. The event is hosted by the Green Party, where academic Kristin Shi-Kupfer and writer Zhou Qing will speak as well.

We're intrigued and impressed how Wong and Li managed to get asylum in Germany, but how will they fare there? Hope they've been learning German... would they change their political stance of mainlanders now that they can count Ai Weiwei and Liu Xia as their fellow dissidents?

Germany's Humanitarian Dilemma

A timely reminder of Germany's constitution of opening its doors

I saw these banners posted in front of the Semperoper or opera house in Dresden:
Open our eyes.
Open our hearts.
Open our doors.
Human dignity is inviolable.

-- Article 1 of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Germany

They immediately made me think of the Syrian, Iranian and Afghani refugees Germany took in since the summer of 2015, when thousands of them were stuck at Hungary's main train station. Today there are about 1.4 million of them in Germany, grateful to be safe from war and persecution.

Merkel visiting refugee children taking classes in school

However, Chancellor Angela Merkel's generous humanitarian action has cost her politically, with native Germans not happy with the massive influx of people who are not one of their own, even though these refugees must integrate and learn how to speak German to be able to thrive.

Our tour guide in Frankfurt blamed Merkel for the current economic situation. He said when he was a child, his father could easily provide for him, his sister and mother, afford a car and take a holiday once a year.

Today the 40-year-old said he and his wife both work -- they don't have children yet -- and they can't afford to buy another car.

Did he not understand that this situation is happening all over the world, not just in Germany? This is not because of the refugee influx. And they wouldn't be competing for his job -- they would be taking the jobs Germans wouldn't want to do.

His dislike of Merkel is misplaced.

I am grateful she has taken in these refugees, and that she has welcomed dissidents like artist Ai Weiwei and Liu Xia, the wife of Liu Xiaobo to Germany.

Liu Xia (centre) and Ai Weiwei (right) meet up in Berlin

It is because Merkel grew up in East Germany since she was an infant and had experienced communism first hand until the age of 35.

Following a series of election setbacks, last October, the Chancellor announced she will step down in 2021 when her term ends. Merkel will also not seek re-election as the head of the Christian Democratic Union of Germany.

Hopefully in the future, Merkel will be vindicated for taking in the refugees not only because of the humanitarian crisis, but also boosting Germany's population to keep the economy going. But for now though, you can feel unease between native Germans and their new neighbours.

Which is why these banners in Dresden are so apt for what is happening today, a reminder to open our eyes, hearts and doors.

Review: Human Flow

Ai Weiwei follows the plight of refugees in 23 countries

Refugees are all over the world, but have you ever met one?

Leaving their home is their last resort -- it is not a decision they take lightly. Uprooting themselves, carrying their belongings and traveling to a place by foot or boat or train without knowing what the conditions will be like, how much it will cost -- if they will make it alive -- is very scary.

But this is what has happened to millions of people who fled Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan in 2015 to Europe and Chinese artist and activist Ai Weiwei was there to document it.

He was moved by these refugees and wanted to document their lives and their deplorable situation in Human Flow. For two hours and 20 minutes, he goes to 23 countries and greets, walks and talks to refugees to learn more about their plight.

They include the Rohingyas, Eritreans, Sudanese, Palestinians, Afghanis, Syrians, Iraqis, Kurds. We see them up close, staring into the camera looking frightened and at other times up from above, looking like ants.

They walk for days to get to the border to find it closed

Mixed in between are "talking heads", people from the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), political leaders, doctors, volunteers, even a Jordanian princess, explaining how they deal with refugees. Some try to show their compassion, others criticize governments for not doing enough.

I've seen footage of refugees in camps on the TV news, but this is watching them as they walk for hours, carrying all their items with them, or having to try to keep warm and relatively dry in a tent when it's pouring rain, or living in a giant hangar with subdivided compounds filled with bunk beds. Many struggle just to get clean water, let alone food and decent shelter.

You quickly empathize with them and wonder if you could survive such a terrible situation where no government wants to accept them and leaves them to fend for themselves in the middle of nowhere. The refugees feel they have come so far that they can't go back to where they came from.

Living conditions in makeshift tents are hardly clean

Interspersed between the different scenes are facts like the average time someone is a refugee is 26 years. Palestinians have been refugees for over 60 years. Again I would read about their struggle in news stories, but actually seeing their living environment really brings it home.

They can be in the middle of making bread in a factory and suddenly the electricity is shut off. The water is less clean and there is garbage everywhere. How do they endure this for so long?

Some of the images terrifyingly beautiful -- oil refineries in Afghanistan are set on fire as Islamic State retreats. A man with a mask calmly walks in his robes towards the raging fire with billowing black smoke. Or people in Kenya walking along the desert in a dust storm.

Periodically you see Ai in the shot, walking along or taking pictures or videos on his phone (some of it is used). Sometimes it seems odd to see him there, but at other times he offers comic relief, such as exchanging his Chinese passport for a Pakistani one with a refugee, or making chuar, or meat skewers over charcoal.

Refugees from climate change in Kenya cross the desert

But he wants viewers to see that he was there on the ground, unlike political leaders who don't seem to know or care about what is going on, and would rather close borders than receive these people who have suffered so much.

More people need to watch Human Flow to understand what refugees have gone through, and have a better appreciation for their own situations. Having to physically and mentally endure so much and be treated like less than human beings is shocking and sad.

China = CCP?

Wang Zhenmin gives his best legal reasons why China and the CCP are one

China continues to drag Hong Kong kicking and screaming closer to the motherland.

This time it's Wang Zhenmin, the legal head of Beijing's liaison office in Hong Kong. He said yesterday that Hongkongers cannot say the city is a part of China and yet reject the Chinese Communist Party.

"From the angle of the world's political map, Hong Kong's political colour had been undoubtedly changed to red since its return to Chinese sovereignty on July 1, 1997. That meant it had become part of red China."

He says since '97 Hong Kong must accept the CCP and China

He said some Hongkongers had asked if they could accept the city was part of the country, but reject the leadership of the CCP.

"I think there is no way to separate China from the Chinese Communist Party, as the nation was led and established by the Chinese Communist Party," he said.

Therefore, the fate of Hong Kong is closely linked with that of the CCP, just as relations between Hong Kong and China are inextricably linked.

Is he insinuating that China was only established since 1949? What happened to the country's purported 5,000 years of history? Where did they go?

Sounds like US President Donald Trump isn't the only one engaged in revisionist history.

Chinese refugees settling into Tiu King Leng in the 1940s

Wang seems to be completely tone deaf to Hongkongers' opinions about China -- and he doesn't seem to understand that a good chunk of the population escaped the mainland to get away from the communists.

He also seems to think (or wants us to think) China and the CCP are one. The leadership believes the more they say it the more we'll believe it.

Sorry to say we're a cynical bunch, Mr Wang. China and the CCP are two different things to Hongkongers. Taiwan would also agree...

Asylum Denied to Refugees who Sheltered Snowden

Lawyer Robert Tibbo with the refugees who sheltered Snowden in 2013

Is it a coincidence?

Four people who came to Hong Kong at different times and filed refugee claims were recently rejected at the same time. They have 14 days to appeal, but could face imminent detention and deportation.

One is from the Philippines, and the others are from Sri Lanka. The one common thread is that they helped house NSA whistle-blower Edward Snowden for two weeks in their homes when he was in Hong Kong in 2013.

Edward Snowden hid in Hong Kong for two weeks

"The Immigration Department rejected their cases on the foundation that the department did not believe the asylum seekers assisted Mr Snowden... The decisions are completely unreasonable," said Robert Tibbo, their Canadian lawyer, accusing the government of not complying with international obligations.

It seems the Immigration Department reactivated these four cases after the story of the four harbouring Snowden was revealed last September in a story in the National Post and in Oliver Stone's film Snowden, starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who has also appealed for help for the refugees.

The movie and the media have shone a spotlight on the plight of refugees in Hong Kong which is hardly a walk in the park. Many refugees are in limbo in the city for many years, unable to work, waiting for their cases to be processed. Some get desperate and start dealing in drugs which increases their chances of getting caught and if they do, they can find themselves in even worse situations.

Joseph Gordeon-Levitt in the movie Snowden

In the case of these four, Tibbo believes his clients were singled out for helping the former NSA and CIA contractor.

"I felt they already had the decision to reject the clients written up a long time ago... Their screening was expedited not to protect them, but to dispense their cases," he said.

However, a spokesman for the Security Bureau said the "accusation that the Immigration Department targets any particular claimants or categories of claimants is unfounded and not true."

He said the Immigration Department will continue expediting the screening of claims "with a view to clearing the backlog of claims pending screening as soon as possible."

As of March, there were 8,956 claims pending decision.

When the four heard their fate, they have been terrified ever since, worried that they may be deported at anytime.

They have already lodged applications to Canada and are waiting to hear back -- and we hope for their sake they will hear some good news very soon.