Friday - 29 March 2024 - 12:54 PM

Visa restrictions on Chinese officials by US

Special Desk

US has imposed visa restrictions on Chinese officials over the Hong Kong law. The US President Donald Trump had recently promised to punish Beijing over a proposed security law.

The US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said that Washington is imposing visa restrictions on Chinese Communist Party officials believed to be responsible for undermining freedoms in Hong Kong. He said sanctions targeted current and former party officials.

He said the move followed President Donald Trump’s promise to punish Beijing over a proposed security law that could erode Hong Kong’s autonomy. China in turn has said the US decision was a mistake and that it should be revoked.

The decision comes just days ahead of a meeting of China’s parliament. The Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress will discuss the new law at its meeting. China has proposed security legislation that would make it a crime to undermine Beijing’s authority in Hong Kong, and could also see China installing its own security agencies in the territory for the first time.

The move has sparked a new wave of anti-mainland protests in Hong Kong. Pompeo’s statement which did not name the Chinese officials affected by the US visa restrictions, followed a recent vote by the US Senate to impose sanctions on individuals who undermine Hong Kong’s autonomy and the banks that do business with them.

The Chinese embassy in Washington said it firmly opposes the US side’s wrongful decisions. And it called the decision should be changed.

On its Twitter handle the embassy added: “We urge the US side to immediately correct its mistakes, withdraw the decision and stop interfering in China’s domestic affairs.”

The US president said Beijing was replacing “its promised formula of One Country, Two Systems with One Country, One System”.

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