Transcription
Can I ask you or any member in this audience, has Britain ever directly elected its prime minister? Never. Never has the United States ever directly elected its president. Never. The Americans have never directly elected its president.
>> Point of information >> because this is what you have in Britain. This is what you have on the other side of the Atlantic. Direct election has never been the case in Britain or in the United States. Now, coming back to your question, why do you want to have Hong Kong have something that you don't have yourself? Confucious said, don't do to others that you do not want others do to you.
Welcome to the Cambridge Union for tonight's Hong Kong debate. Just to be clear, in case there's anybody in here from the Daily Mail, we are the Cambridge Union, not the Cambridge University Students Union. Without further ado, I would like to welcome our first speaker for the proposition, at least virtually. Martin Lee, who is on our video live link and will be appearing shortly, is a Hong Kong politician and barristister. He is the founding chairman of the United Democrats of Hong Kong and its successor, the Democratic Party. Nicknamed the father of democracy in Hong Kong, he is recognized as one of the most prominent advocates for democracy and human rights in Hong Kong and in China. The motion is that this house believes China is the new imperial power in Hong Kong. Martin, you have the ear of the house.
>> Good evening everyone. We apologize for not being able to be physically present, but you'll see us not only in spirit, you're actually seeing us. Now this proposition is so obvious that if it is debated in Hong Kong, people will attend of course and I will in fact invite intervention now because I want to hear what you guys have to say. As I say won't be happy with you if you're not on my side.
>> Heard it. He's invited interventions from the floor. So, those of you who disagree, go for it. I know we invited at least three people who disagree. So, come on.
>> You're scared of shopping.
>> Point of information over there. Could you wait for the microphone because he won't hear you without it? simply not as a challenge but as a point of clarification. The motion says new imperial power.
>> Well, China of course is a sovereign power as far as Hong Kong is concerned. Hong Kong is part of China. There's no doubt about that. And it's written into the basic law. Hong Kong is an inelineable part of China and that is why there cannot be any independence. All right? And we are not pushing. I have never pushed for independence for Hong Kong. All right? Because I I'm holding China to its own promises which they call their basic policies regarding Hong Kong. And I've been doing in in politics and even today I've been pushing for that. Hong Kong people in fact support the joint declaration and the basic law. But now China wants to make slight make light of the joint declaration. They say it's no longer relevant. Why? Because China has already got sovereign defect from Hong Kong, Koon and the territories. So, China should not be doing that. China should honor promises. Yes, it should. China is a sovereign power for Hong Kong. No doubt about that. Sovereignty, no question. Right. Indeed, as of midnight, 1 of July 1997, that part of the equation was fulfilled. one country was there and there was never any doubt about that that the young people of Hong Kong are not pushing for independence. They want China to honor the promises contained in the British Declaration and the Basic Law. Now, not only old people like me want to hold China to its agreement. The young people and you'll hear from Georgia and uh I'm old enough to be his grandfather and they are fighting. They are risking their future and you'll hear them soon. May I have another intervention, please?
>> I I think timewise that maybe if we had a very quick intervention, we might be able to take it, but perhaps I would urge you to give a 30-cond summary of your position, Martin, just to end your speech.
>> Yeah. So, what we want now is very simple. We we're not asking for anything new. Democracy was promised. No intervention to Beijing as promised. We just want Beijing to honor his promises and the world should defend us because the world support the joint decoration at the after lobbying from China. So now China has got international attention of Hong Kong. They are entitled to what they say uh because they supported the joint declaration one country two systems and they still support it. Thank you. [applause] Thank you very much, Martin, for that speech. A special thanks because it is 4 in the morning in Hong Kong. I'd like to welcome our first speaker for the opposition tonight, Victor Gao. Victor is the chairman of the Yale Law School Association of China. In the 1980s, he was an English interpreter for Deng Xiaoing. He was with the Chinese premier's official visit to Britain in 1985. He was the China policy adviser with the Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission around 2000. Victor, the floor is yours. [applause]
>> Thank you, Mr. Chairman, ladies and gentlemen. Uh it's a great honor to be with you here. First of all, please allow me to invite you to join me to express our condolences to those people who died in the corona virus in China and elsewhere. And also, please also allow me to invite you to join me to express our solidarity to this heroic and epic fight against corona virus. This fight is not for China alone. This fight is for mankind. And I believe eventually we will win this fight and the Chinese people, the British people and the people of all the world will succeed in this fight against the corona virus. Now we listened very carefully to what Mr. Martin Lee had to say. I would say to call China a new imperial power in Hong Kong is a distortion of history, is a distortion of reality and is a distortion of future which is to come. We all know about the history of Hong Kong. For more than 2,000 years, Hong Kong has been a part of China ever since Emperor Ching Shuang united China in 221 BC. We know what happened in the 19th century. Hong Kong was taken away by Britain, the Imperial Britain after the Opium War. But on the Chinese side, the Chinese government in the Republic of China period and ever since 1949 in the People's Republic of China period have never recognized the legitimacy of those treaties. They call those treaties unequal treaty. They don't recognize, they didn't recognize Hong Kong as a colony of Britain. They called it occupied the land and they believe they have the right to take over Hong Kong back to the motherland. That's what happened in 1997. Now Martin Lee talked about Deng Xiaoing. I worked with Deng Xiaoing for more than 20 important meetings he had with foreign visitors in Beijing. And I would say Deng Xiaoing will be very traumatized. They're not happy today to see what is happening in Hong Kong which is tearing Hong Kong apart. Now the one country two system although proposed by Den Xiaoing was actually a wisdom and a sign of courage and vision demonstrated by the Chinese government together with the British government. It takes two to tango. Without the Chinese government's participation and the British government's effort of cooperation, we would not have had a smooth transfer of sovereignty from Britain to China in 1997. We did have a very smooth transfer of sovereignty. It worked well for Britain. It worked well for China and it worked well for the people in Hong Kong. Now, China will remain the sovereign, as Martin mentioned, in Hong Kong for the rest of all of us in this room and for many, many years beyond that. That's for sure. China is the sovereign of Hong Kong for more than 2,000 years. It will remain the sovereign for all the years we can imagine to come. Martin Martin also mentioned that democracy is important. I'm a firm believer in democracy. I'm a firm pursue pursuer and promoter of democracy. Please allow me to finish my point. Then I'll come back to your question. Sir, without democracy, there will be no modernization. And without democracy, you cannot explain the tremendous amount of transformation which has taken place in China for the past 41 years, which has lifted more than 800 million people out of poverty. And that number is more than all the amount of people lifted out of poverty since the beginning of the industrial re revolution started here in Britain. [clears throat] Democracy is important but allow me to mention democracy without rule of law will be democracy. It will soon degenerate into chaos and anarchy. Human rights are important. I will fight against anyone who wants to take away my human rights. But human rights without democracy, human rights without rule of law will degenerate into disorder and anarchy. So please agree with me when we talk about democracy, when we talk about human rights, always think about rule of law. These are Siamese twins. They cannot live without each other. We also know when the British left Hong Kong in 1997, allow me to talk about the truth. The British did not leave behind too much democracy in Hong Kong. That's a fact. But let's give the British what they deserve. They did leave behind a deeply entrenched rule of law tradition and that has served as the backbone of Hong Kong ever since then. Now whether democracy in Hong Kong is perfect, I don't think so. There's always room to further promote democracy in Hong Kong. But do you want to promote democracy at the cost of rule of law? Allow me to emphasize one point. You cannot achieve democracy by smashing rule of law. The better way for Hong Kong is to promote democracy and protect human rights by committing to rule of law rather than going the other way. Therefore, we may have differences about the political situation in Hong Kong. We may have questions or answers or challenges about the situation in China. But also allow me to mention one point. The situation in China today is much better than 41 years ago. And the situation in Hong Kong today is in a very very delicate and dangerous situation. Because if you see the society torn apart, if you see throwing of petetrobomb at innocent people, if you see burning HSBC which is actually a British firm, if you see holding people fearing for their own lives, if you see kids can no longer going to school, do you call it democracy? Do you call it pursuit of human rights? No. This is wrong. This is the wrong side of the argument. Now, China is not an imperial power. What is the fun of Vietnam Empire in the world of today? I took classes with Professor Paul Kennedy when he taught at Yale. He was with Cambridge. He wrote the book, The Rise and the Fall of the Great Power. And in that book, he mentioned the overreach of empire. see the rise and eventual the fall or the collapse of empires. China does not want to see become an empire. If China wants to be an empire in the world, either in Hong Kong, which is a misnomer, it's a wrong characterization of the situation or in anywhere in the world. See, I will join you to oppose a rising Chinese empire. That will not happen. Deniaing will not allow that. President Xiinping will not allow that to happen. The Chinese people will not allow that to happen. Do I still have time?
>> Yes.
>> I want to answer your question, sir.
>> Thank you very much. Um, well, first, Hong Kong was of course part of theQing dynasty. It wasn't part of the People's Republic of China until 1997, but we'll ignore that. Um, you speak of democracy and the rule of law. In 2014, when a lot of people went into the streets to protest at the fact that China wasn't keeping its promise for direct elections for the chief executive, um, there wasn't there weren't really rule of law issues then. We didn't see protests. I mean a lot of these you know really as you call them violent protests spirited protests however you want to call them emerged have been have been emerging now because it's been years and years and years since that date when we were promised direct elections I'm from Hong Kong sorry should have said that so um could you just speak to your love of democracy there thank you
>> thank you for your question [applause] can I ask you or any member in this audience has Britain ever directly elected its prime minister. Never. Never has the United States ever directly elected its president. Never. The Americans have never directly elected its president.
>> Point of information >> because this is what you have in Britain. This is what you have on the other side of the Atlantic. Direct election has never been the case in Britain or in the United States. Now, coming back to your question, why do you want to have Hong Kong have something that you don't have yourself? Confusion said, don't do to others that you do not want others do to you. This should be the better philosophy. So, let Hong Kong decide what they want to do. And if they eventually have their wisdom together, they will have whatever election that suits the Hong Kong people. And that's not a sign of imperial power of China. That's eventually what will happen in Hong Kong.
>> I I think we're in the last minute of the speech, so I think we'll round it up and move on. If you have a 30-cond summary.
>> Thank you very much. Now, I'll be very brief. The situation in Hong Kong is important. I used to grow up in the 1970s where Hong Kong had more fixed line telephones than mainland China combined together. But now the neighboring Shenzhen has larger population than Hong Kong has higher GDP than Hong Kong and is becoming a tech center in the world. Therefore, I would say for all my compatriots in Hong Kong, I'm a Hong Kong permanent resident. I would say Hong Kong need to get its act together. Hong Kong need to focus on economic development. Hong Kong need to promote democracy and human rights by promoting rule of law rather than smashing rule of law. I would say what you see happening in Hong Kong over the past seven months. The violence and the rioting that's happened in Hong Kong cannot be tolerated here in London or here in Cambridge or in Oxford or there in any city in the United States. Therefore, while we all treasure democracy, while we all are committed to human rights, don't forget the other side of the equation that is the importance of rule of law. Without rule of law, you will never have real well-defined democracy and human rights. And that's what Hong Kong want. Hong Kong want to have greater democracy, greater rule of law, and greater human rights. That's what we, the people in Hong Kong, deserve. Thank you, Mr. President. [applause] GDP.