Hong Kong Protests: The View From Taiwan

The two democracies in Beijing’s shadow – Hong Kong and Taiwan — have a recent history of impacting the other’s civil society.

On June 9, hundreds of thousands of Hong Kong citizens filled the streets of the city’s business and administrative centers at Central and Admiralty to protest an extradition bill that would allow fugitives to be sent to governments that Hong Kong does not currently have an extradition treaty with — including China, Taiwan, and Macau. The bill and its main proponent, Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam, created controversy in the territory as critics worried it may effectively end the city’s independent judiciary and criminal justice process, and hand too much control over criminal justice to Beijing. The initial protests against the bill drew an estimated 1.03 million people on the evening of June 9, according to the bill’s opponents. If substantiated, this would be the city’s largest protest: more than 10 percent of its population turned out. Protesters gathered again on June 12, this time blocking major streets and calling for a general strike to prevent the bill’s looming passage.

The Hong Kong government originally insisted that it would push the bill through anyway. But on June 15, in response to the mounting pressure, Lam announced she would suspend the controversial bill. Protesters were not appeased. In addition to wanting the bill withdrawn from consideration entirely, activists demanded that Hong Kong’s government apologize for and address alleged police brutality against protesters on June 12. Many even called for Lam to step down. The protests on June 16 making those demands were even larger than the June 9 rally. Up to 2 million Hong Kongers — a full 25 percent of the population — reportedly turned out. 

Nearby, 23 million Taiwanese are watching, and either outcome of the protests — further political capitulation or crackdown — will likely impact Taiwanese voters going into the 2020 presidential elections.

The bill has been followed in Taiwan for several months. Taipei has been seeking the extradition of a Hong Kong man who murdered his Taiwanese girlfriend but slipped off the island before authorities could catch him. Yet Taiwanese also understand such a bill would put dissidents and others who run afoul of Beijing — including many pro-independence Taiwanese — at greater risk of being extradited and criminally processed in China should they travel to Hong Kong. Due to questionable terminology in Hong Kong’s Basic Law, often referred to as its “mini constitution,” Beijing has asserted extradition is a matter of its sovereignty. Beijing also insists affairs in Taiwan are a matter of its sovereignty, making activities in Taiwan that draw Beijing’s ire a matter of China’s sovereignty.

Protests are nothing new to either Hong Kong or Taiwan, both of which held mass protests in 2014 against government policy that threatened the integrity of both democratic systems. For Taiwan it was the Sunflower Movement (which marked its five-year anniversary this spring), an occupation of the legislature and central Taipei in protest against former pro-China President Ma Ying-jeou’s attempts to force through his economic integration project. For Hong Kong, the Umbrella Movement that began in September 2014 was a sustained occupation of central Hong Kong, protesting a reform bill that would give Hong Kongers the right to directly elect their chief executive – but only by choosing among candidates effectively pre-screened by Beijing.

Both protests in 2014 captured the news in Taiwan: Taiwan could be the model for Hong Kong, while Hong Kong served as a warning against the “one country, two systems” model Beijing was attempting to entice Taiwan with.