Yonden Lhatoo

Just Saying | Is the US encouraging murderers and rapists to hide in Hong Kong by suspending extradition treaty?

Yonden Lhatoo says the Trump administration has not only cut off the city’s nose to spite China’s face, it has also shot itself in the foot by killing a reciprocal deal that allowed the transfer of fugitive offenders

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Mainland Chinese police hand over robbery suspects to Hong Kong authorities. The US often made use of its extradition deal with the city, which sent over 69 fugitives at Washington’s request. Photo: Edward Wong

Yonden Lhatoo

Published: 5:20pm, 22 Aug 2020Updated: 10:08pm, 22 Aug 2020

For all the magnanimity, nobility and divine right theory it preaches as it goes about unilaterally righting the world’s wrongs, the United States can be astonishingly bloody minded and ridiculously petty.

A case in point is its slapping of sanctions on nearly a dozen top Hong Kong and mainland Chinese officials over the imposition of this city’s national security law. Going beyond the hypocrisy of opposing and blatantly interfering in a sovereign nation’s right to protect itself – while enforcing America’s own national security laws to the fullest, with no qualms – Washington has descended to a new low by deliberately revealing the personal details of those on the sanctions list, including their home addresses and passport numbers.

This was essentially state-sanctioned doxxing, and a manifestation of the mean, small-minded, schoolyard level of pettiness that is a hallmark of US President Donald Trump’s personal style, now being adopted wholesale by his administration in conducting international relations.

The Trump administration has imposed economic sanctions on 11 current and former Chinese officials, including Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam. Photo: May Tse

The usual bungling that is another trademark of the Trump administration was also on full display in getting Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor’s residential address wrong in the doxxing list. Lam mockingly likened it to how US authorities messed up Edward Snowden’s middle name in official documents, a discrepancy that Hong Kong cited as an excuse for not complying with Washington’s demands for his extradition when the former CIA analyst-turned-whistle-blower was hiding in the city back in 2013.

As the Trump administration brings out its many knives, sharp or blunt, to cut off Hong Kong’s nose just to spite China’s face, such is the zeal driving this unholy crusade against Beijing that it’s quite content to shoot itself in the foot during the process, pardon the mixed metaphors.