In 1886, when the British author, Robert Louis Stevenson, published his novel The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, it became an instant success. It told the tale of Dr Jekyll, a benevolent scientist who investigated the darker side of life, and his alter ego, Mr Hyde, who was malevolence personified. The story gripped the national consciousness, and, to this day, people with different sides to their personalities are described as “Jekyll and Hyde” characters.
Stevenson’s story inevitably springs to mind when considering the activities of the United Kingdom’s foreign secretary, James Cleverly. On Aug 30, when he visited Beijing, in an effort to steady ties after a rocky period in which Britain slavishly followed US policy positions, including on Hong Kong, he demonstrated his pragmatism. Although he trotted out some complaints about China’s policies in several areas, including on Hong Kong, he was going through the motions, given the need to pacify the domestic critics who opposed his trip.
Overall, however, Cleverly’s tone in Beijing was positive, and he showed he wanted to do business and make up for lost time. He told Bloomberg that he had sought to find common ground with his hosts, and this was “about engaging directly with the Chinese government, building lines of communication, addressing the areas where we have disagreements, but also looking at opportunities to work together on some of the major issues affecting both our countries and the world, whether that be climate change, the resolution of the war in Ukraine, or indeed the opportunity to build our economies.”
This all sounded very statesmanlike, and he declared that the UK was “open for business from China”. The calls for disengagement between the UK and China were, he emphasized, “not a credible option”.
If, however, this was Cleverly’s Dr Jekyll persona, he reverted to Mr Hyde on Sept 19, when he issued the UK Foreign Office’s 53rd sixth-monthly report on Hong Kong, covering the first six months of 2023. It was apparent to everybody that the measured statesman from Beijing had morphed into a political bootboy over Hong Kong, and it was not a pretty sight. Even though the report, introduced by the UK Foreign Office after 1997, has long since forfeited any credibility, given its bias and misrepresentations, the latest version is abysmal, and Cleverly has demeaned himself by signing off on it.
If Cleverly imagined he could bully little Hong Kong at will, he was sorely mistaken, and a Hong Kong government spokesman immediately put him straight.
He condemned Cleverly’s “groundless attacks, slanders and smears” against the city, and pointed out how the UK had ignored the extent to which the National Security Law for Hong Kong (which the report traduced) had “enabled the livelihood and economic activities of the Hong Kong community at large to resume as normal and the business environment to be restored”.
As in his previous report, Cleverly disregarded last year’s momentous news over the future of Hong Kong, which should have provided the context for anything he wished to say. When President Xi Jinping visited Hong Kong on July 1, 2022, he announced that “one country, two systems” will continue after 2047, the date contemplated for its expiry by the Basic Law. As the Sino-British Joint Declaration only envisaged the city’s capitalist system and way of life continuing for 50 years after 1997, the British should, like everybody in Hong Kong, have been delighted, instead of which Cleverly’s report contains no expressions of gratitude to Xi, which is a remarkable (and revelatory) omission.
After all, the continuation of Hong Kong’s highly acclaimed common law-based legal system will be central to its long-term viability and success, as everybody (with, it seems, the exception of Cleverly) can readily appreciate.
By contrast, Cleverly has gone out of his way to flag up the reports of two inquiries — one on the banks, the other on media freedom — conducted by the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Hong Kong (APPG). It is controlled by some of Hong Kong’s most rabid critics, including Alistair Carmichael and Lord (David) Alton, a zealot if ever there was one. Indeed, Alton was sanctioned by China in 2021 for what it called the malicious spreading of “lies and disinformation” about China, and he has even sought to prohibit trade between the UK and China.
What is even worse is that, through its consultancy, Whitehouse Communications, the APPG is financed by Stand with Hong Kong (SWHK), a subversive organization that, through crowdfunding and other means, supported the insurrection in Hong Kong in 2019-20. As the High Court was told in 2021, SWHK also had close links with media magnate Jimmy Lai Chee-ying, currently facing trial for allegedly endangering national security, and its role included campaigning in the US and elsewhere for foreign sanctions to be imposed on Hong Kong.
It follows, therefore, that any reports produced by the APPG are debased and not worth the paper they are written on, and it beggars belief that Cleverly has chosen to give them publicity in his report.
He also devotes space to Hong Kong’s decision to restrict overseas lawyers representing national security suspects in criminal cases. Although restrictions are entirely understandable, given that State secrets may be compromised if they are placed in the hands of overseas actors, it does not affect the right of suspects to choose locally qualified lawyers, even if they are foreigners, which Cleverly ignores. Overseas lawyers can still seek admission without restriction in other sorts of cases, which is not possible in the UK (or the US), and this information, even though essential to understanding the issue, is also suppressed.
Although Cleverly claims that “the targeted persecution of people with dissenting views persists”, he fails to counterbalance this with any acknowledgment that Hong Kong operates a highly successful criminal justice system in which suspects can be convicted only if their guilt is proved beyond reasonable doubt. While he has chosen to disregard it, the World Justice Project Rule of Law Index 2022, fortunately, has not. It ranked Hong Kong as 22nd out of the 140 jurisdictions surveyed, ahead, for example, of the US, at 26th, Poland at 36th, and Greece at 44th, which was no mean feat, particularly in the wake of an insurrection.
When, however, it comes to grandstanding, Cleverly has shown he is second to none. He declared, “The UK will always defend universal human rights, including freedom of expression, association and peaceful assembly, and we will stand up for those who are targeted.” If this is right, he should have explained why it is that, whereas the National Security Law for Hong Kong explicitly states that “human rights shall be respected and protected in safeguarding national security”, and that the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (with its fair trial guarantees) “shall be protected in accordance with the law” (Article 4), the UK’s National Security Act 2023, which took effect in July (and has been roundly condemned as draconian by media groups and others), contains no mention whatsoever of human rights protections.
Once again, in his concluding remarks, Cleverly has trotted out the hoary old myth, beloved of Sinophobes everywhere, that “China remains in a state of ongoing non-compliance with the Joint Declaration”. This, of course, is a bit rich coming from somebody whose government has, for example, violated the Joint Declaration (as the UK’s former attorney general, Peter Goldsmith, confirmed in 2008) by handing out visas with a view to providing British citizenship to over 150,000 BN(O) passport holders.
Far from violating the Joint Declaration, China has upheld Hong Kong’s legal system, supported its economy, and protected it from those who wished it ill, and it deserves praise all around, including from the UK.
Everybody, therefore, must hope that Cleverly wises up very soon; otherwise, his credibility will be shredded. He must realize that if he wants to be taken seriously, he must avoid propaganda, and should always play to his Dr Jekyll side.
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.
