Guys. China is not that bad, you are just listening to Western propaghanda. This happens in western democracies all the time. Diplomats just go missing. It's a common occurrence.
You truly believe that at the least if not us, the USA has never made people go missing?
China has a long history of arresting, detaining and disappearing dissidents on trumped up charges. Ai Wei Wei was charged with "tax evasion", those former Canadian diplomats detained were charged with "stealing state secrets" after the Huawei CFO extradition request. It's a standard tactic.
If you are rich in China, it's pretty much impossible to escape influence by the CCP. Even publicly traded Hong Kong majority owned companies, there is no escaping Chinese ruling party influence. Take for example Cathy Pacific's CEO for example.
When Chinese authorities demanded that the CEO, Rupert Hogg (who was well liked by employees and turned around the company, posting it's first profit in three years), turn over the names of all Cathy Pacific employees who had participated in the protests, the CEO defended his employees by only submitting his own name to the Chinese government. The majority shareholder of Swire group, owner of CP, was then summoned to Beijing, and both Rupert Hogg and his deputy were forced to submitted their resignations. https://onemileatatime.com/cathay-pa...ion-backstory/
This is the type of influence Hong Kong does not want... but pretty much can't escape that this point.
This is ultimately what really frustrates me about places like China, Russia, North Korea, or the 150 or so other countries that have significant degrees of corruption and inequality. The people in power are ultimately making their own lives worse by supporting regressive policies and regimes.
Less traffic accidents. Less pollution. Safer food. More advances in medicine. Better entertainment and media options. Freedom of expression and association. Happier people. It is not a coincidence liberal democracies are better places to live for both rich and poor.
I feel for the people of Hong Kong. They are fighting against a regime that hurts everyone, including us here in Canada.
They've effectively taken full control of a territory that they already had de-facto control over, but lost any chance of peaceful reintegration with Taiwan. Any proposed, one country, two systems proposal for Taiwan/PRC unification will be laughed at by Taiwan as a sham.
That chance sailed ten to fifteen years ago, if not longer. The worst possible insult you could say to someone in Taiwan is: 你是大陸人嗎? “Ni shi dalu ren ma?”
Which translates directly to: “Are you a mainlander?”
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It's incredible the resistance these people are putting up in Hong Kong - the government doesn't care and never will though. They'll wear them down and eventually all of this will be for nothing.
It's incredible the resistance these people are putting up in Hong Kong - the government doesn't care and never will though. They'll wear them down and eventually all of this will be for nothing.
You should still try to avoid buying things that were made in China, or working with Chinese companies.