In recent years, the Hong Kong government has been arresting many activists, passing the arrests off as impacting the country’s national security. As reported on June 12th, 2024, by France 24, Hong Kong has just issued an arrest with $128,000 bounties for 13 activists based abroad who are accused of national security crimes. The six men accused of the crimes are based in the U.K. The convicted include pro-democracy lawmaker Nathan Lau, Veteran unionist Mung Siutat, and activists Simon Cheng, Finn Lau, Fok Ka-chi, and Choi Ming-da. As activist arrests in Hong Kong continue to rise, the government is taking measures to increase the incentive, believing that canceling the abroad-based activists’ passports would toughen the blow. 

The Hong Kong government has not been shy in calling out these activists, undermining their goals, to justify their arrests. City leader John Lee stated that the activists were “a threat to our [Hong Kong] democracy and fundamental human rights.” The six have been accused of crimes of national security, including incitement to secession, incitement to subversion, and foreign collusion. The Hong Kong government continuously makes public statements against pro-democracy activists. According to Al Jazeera, a government spokesman said, “they also make scaremongering remarks to smear and slander the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. They continue to collude with external forces to protect their evil deeds. We, therefore, have taken such measures to give them a strong blow,” referring to the convicted. One of the convicted spoke out against the arrest, believing it went against his free speech. Nathan Lau took to the social media platform X, previously known as Twitter, saying that the arrest was “an explicit act of transnational repression and that it would not stop him from campaigning for what he believed in.”

Hong Kong officials cited the recently passed “national security law” as the legal basis for canceling the passports. After a year of anti-government protests, the National Security Law (N.S.L.) was imposed in 2020. The U.S. and its allies, such as Britain and Australia, have spoken against the National Security Act passed by China as Australian Minister of Foreign Affairs Penny Wong stated, “the systemic erosion of Hong Kong’s rights, freedoms, autonomy, and democratic process has been consistently raised with China and Hong Kong.” The U.S. Department of State declared that these new laws directly threaten U.S. interests, stating on their website a very similar statement to Wong’s saying that they violate the fundamental freedoms and human rights of the people in Hong Kong. The law was made because Hong Kong and Beijing authorities believed it provided political stability, with four punishable offenses: subversion, secession, terrorism, and collusion. 

Al Jazeera reported that the Hong Kong government has not provided safety or stability to the six activists whose passports have been confiscated. The United States declared that the laws making these actions criminal are impacting the safety of those in Hong Kong and harassing individuals and nations along its borders. The United States should continue to speak out against the human rights violations that are justified by these new national security laws and publicize the six convicted who have lost their passports to ensure a safe travel home.