Lawmakers Launch Audit of Hong Kong and Chinese Officials’ Assets

Audit

Members of Parliament are putting pressure on the UK government to release a root and branch audit of properties held by Hong Kong and Chinese authorities connected to human rights infractions. A cross-party group of 110 parliamentarians has actually written to the Foreign Secretary Liz Truss, mentioning a research study by pressure group Hong Kong Watch, which declares it has actually discovered 5 Hong Kong authorities and 6 legislators complicit in the continuous human rights crackdown presently own home in the UK.

The letter is being sent out to mark the upcoming secondary anniversary of the intro of the National Security Law, which has actually seen civil society stamped out in Hong Kong with hundreds jailed and sent to prison.

The British MPs state the audit’s findings might act as a path to the UK “finally introducing a Hong Kong specific Magnitsky-style sanctions specific sanctions list.”

“It is absolutely imperative that anybody accused of human rights violations, including in Hong Kong, is unable to hold assets or property here in the UK,” said one of the letter’s signatures, Siobhain McDonagh MP.

She added: “We must ask ourselves what it means to be complicit and whether our human rights rhetoric stands up to reality. A full audit of these assets is urgently needed.”

The letter likewise follows the arrests of a variety of other popular pro-democracy activists in Hong Kong under the Beijing imposed National Security Law– consisting of 90-year-old Cardinal Zen, who was apprehended recently.

It is likewise created to moisten the upcoming setup as Kong Kong’s brand-new Chief Executive, John Lee, the pro-Beijing hardliner taking over from present leader Carrie Lam, following the city’s president election– in which he was the sole prospect.

Letter signer Tom Tugendhat MP, stated a much deeper understanding of the possessions that Chinese Communist Party (CCP) authorities keep in the UK is an essential action.

“This work should start now,” he added.

Another signature, Sir Iain Duncan Smith MP, a prominent and vocal critic of Beijing in the British Parliament,  said: “As we approach the second anniversary of Beijing enforcing its draconian National Security Law on Hong Kong, the Foreign Secretary should learn from the united western response to Russia’s brutal war in Ukraine and undertake an audit of the assets of Hong Kong and Chinese officials in the UK.”

Smith stated this would act as a path to the UK  “finally introducing a Hong Kong specific Magnitsky-style sanctions list against those officials responsible for the ongoing human rights violations in the city.”

The so-called Magnitsky sanctions target those responsible for human rights offenses or corruption– and the name originates from the case of Sergei Magnitsky, a Russian tax legal representative who in 2007 revealed a $230 million scams devoted by tax authorities in the Russian Interior Ministry. He was imprisoned in Russia in 2008 on charges of tax evasion and passed away in prison in 2009, having actually suffered human rights offenses while in detention.

Other countries have actually given that enacted comparable legislation. The U.S. Congress passed the Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act in 2012, while the Global Human Rights Magnitsky Accountability Act was passed in 2016.

Other nations have actually likewise passed their own Magnitsky legislation, consisting of Canada in 2017 and the European Union in 2020.

H/T The Epoch Times

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