Creation: Historical Materialism Group of the Proletarian Liberation Struggle Association
Recently, according to Lianhe Zaobao, Hong Kong Secretary for Justice Law Chi-kwong responded to the fact that those arrested in Hong Kong for participating in the anti-extradition movement have yet to be prosecuted by stating, “Prosecutors must comprehensively assess evidence and relevant circumstances before making prosecution decisions, and there is no statute of limitations for criminal cases in Hong Kong.” Additionally, in an interview with Hong Kong’s Sing Tao Daily, he said, “…the freedom currently enjoyed by those arrested but not prosecuted is no different from that of ordinary citizens.” What does this mean? On the surface, it suggests that although these people have been arrested, they remain “innocent until proven guilty” and can “live normally.” However, based on this, Law Chi-kwong also claimed that there is no “statute of limitations” on their “prosecution decisions,” implying that as long as the Chinese revisionists are willing, they can prosecute them at any time.
The so-called “rule of law” that the Chinese revisionists always boast about has, in Hong Kong, brutally arrested 6,000 participants in the anti-extradition movement whose charges remain uncertain. Why did they arrest them in the first place? Isn’t that baseless? If they are arrested merely on groundless charges, doesn’t that further prove that the Chinese revisionist state’s power—its army, police, prisons, etc.—is actually a force greater than any Hong Kong law, functioning solely to suppress the Hong Kong anti-China revisionist movement? It is evident that in this anti-extradition movement, the class nature of the Chinese revisionist state apparatus was fully revealed. Laws at any time can only serve the ruling class; they are designed to serve the interests of the ruling class. Therefore, under the manipulation of the Chinese revisionists, Hong Kong law can deliberately turn a blind eye to the unwarranted arrests by the revisionist police, continuously oppress those arrested for opposing the revision, smear them as “rioters,” and to this day, no restrictions have been placed on the Chinese revisionist police.
As for the so-called “freedom enjoyed by those arrested but not prosecuted being the same as that of ordinary citizens,” this is even more an absurd and laughable statement in reality. Even if one maintains full trust in the Chinese revisionists, believing that they have ceased to imprison these individuals, since there is no statute of limitations on their prosecution, their formal “freedom” is merely a formality; in practice, it is a kind of unfreedom. The “freedom” they have obtained already contains a threat from the revisionists: you’d better not participate in activities opposing me, or I can take action against you at any time. Whether the Chinese revisionists have already begun planning a counterattack against those anti-extradition protesters who were forced to be released under pressure from the Hong Kong people’s struggle, preparing to prosecute them immediately after the wind subsides on some groundless charges, is even more suspicious. Given the reactionary class nature of the Chinese revisionists, this is highly possible.
However, from another perspective of this movement, although many participants in the anti-extradition protests were spontaneous resistance against the Chinese revisionist tightening its dictatorship over the Hong Kong people, as Lenin said, “all reforms are merely making this machine more perfect, not destroying it.” Different exploiting classes and groups may have contradictions, but in suppressing the people, they are united. Therefore, the previous state machinery can certainly be used by the successor. Whether it is imperialist Britain or the revisionist social imperialism, whether during the colonial period or the special administrative region period, whether before or after the anti-extradition protests, Hong Kong law has always been the law of the ruling class, used to suppress the Hong Kong people. The way out for the Hong Kong people does not lie in opposing individual reactionary laws and accepting the rest, nor in harboring illusions about one imperialist while opposing another, nor in unorganized, spontaneous movements even exploited by other imperialists. It lies in organizing themselves, following the path of socialist revolution, overthrowing the Chinese revisionist regime that oppresses both mainland and Hong Kong peoples, and achieving liberation for all of China.