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ChinaPolitics

Beijing talks up case for intervention in Hong Kong, labelling protests ‘colour revolution’

  • Xinhua moves from previous comparisons with ‘colour revolution’ to directly giving the protests that description
  • It quotes late leader Deng Xiaoping as having said Beijing ‘should intervene’ if there were turmoil in Hong Kong

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Hong Kong police and anti-government protesters clashed again on Sunday. Photo: Dickson Lee
William ZhengandEcho Xie

Beijing has sent its strongest warning yet that it could deal directly with the protests in Hong Kong, calling them “colour revolutions” and amplifying warnings from senior advisers that the city is engulfed in a battle that would defend or destroy “one country, two systems”.

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In a commentary published on Sunday night, state news agency Xinhua also quoted late Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping as having said in 1984 that the mainland government “should intervene” in the event of unrest in the city.

The commentary was a shift from previous state media tirades that compared the Hong Kong protests to a “colour revolution” to directly apply the label – widely used to refer to uprisings in countries in eastern Europe in the early 2000s – to the unrest.
The agency also echoed a speech given at the weekend by Xu Ze, head of the semi-official Chinese Association of Hong Kong and Macau Studies and a former deputy director of the Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office – China’s top Hong Kong policy office. Xu said Hong Kong risked “sinking into an abyss”, and described the unrest as “a decisive battle between defending or destroying ‘one country, two systems’”.

Xinhua’s commentary said: “The recent [events] in Hong Kong … have gone beyond normal demonstrations and rallies, and were ‘colour revolutions’ meant to fundamentally destroy constitutional law and order of the [Hong Kong] special administrative region. We cannot condone [such acts] and they must be dealt with in accordance with the law.”

It quoted Deng as saying that “if there is turmoil [in Hong Kong], the central government should intervene”.

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