If you’re visiting Hong Kong, bring a burner phone? Think tank chief Bernard Chan aims to dispel ‘totally ridiculous’ talk, tell ‘good stories’ about city
- Chairman of Our Hong Kong Foundation wants to tackle ‘unprecedented smearing and vilification’ from the West
- He wants think tank to be a ‘do-tank’ focused on being ‘an influential advocate for Hong Kong and mainland China’
Bernard Chan, chief of Hong Kong’s biggest think tank and a former top government adviser, has first-hand knowledge of what people outside the city have been saying since Beijing imposed the national security law in 2020.
“Some friends inquired if they had to bring burner phones when visiting Hong Kong to avoid having their phones tapped,” he told the Post in an interview. “This is totally ridiculous.
“A big American firm also told me that with the national security law, officials could check its data centre at any time. This kind of misperception is really killing Hong Kong.”
In his new role as chairman of Our Hong Kong Foundation, the city’s biggest think tank, the 58-year-old businessman and politician is on a mission to tell “good Hong Kong stories” to the world.
“I want to show the real Hong Kong to the world,” he said. “They have to see it to believe it.”
Chan, who was convenor of the influential Executive Council in the previous administration, took the helm at the foundation in September, succeeding its founder and former city leader, Tung Chee-hwa.
He conceded it would be a challenge to dispel Western concerns, misunderstandings and conspiracy theories swirling over the national security law and the coming Article 23 amid rising US-China tensions.
