China imposes visa restrictions on US officials over opposition on Hong Kong security law

Amid the worldwide discontent against China for imposing the new national security law in Hong Kong, the country has imposed a visa ban on the United States officials since America has been a strong critic of China's move of imposing the law in Hong Kong. Besides, the US has been a strong opponent to China's aggressive expansionist policy be it in terms of international trade or the origination and spread of Coronavirus or the territorial disputes China has had with neighbouring countries. 

Beijing has announced visa restrictions on United States officials who have “behaved extremely badly” over Hong Kong, the South China Morning Post (SCMP) reported.

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The US also earlier imposed visa restrictions on members of the Communist Chinese Party (CCP) as a mark of strong retaliation on China's aggressive policies on the semi-autonomous city Hong Kong. Earlier in May end, US President Donald Trump had announced a slew of measures against China including suspending visas of thousands of Chinese graduate students enrolled at US universities and deporting them, imposing other sanctions against Chinese officials and cancelling the special trade exemptions given to Hong Kong.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo had said, "President Trump promised to punish the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) officials who were responsible for eviscerating Hong Kong's freedoms. Today, we are taking action to do just that."

"Beijing's continued actions undermine its commitments and obligations in the Sino-British Joint Declaration to respect Hong Kong's high degree of autonomy. At the same time, Beijing continues to undermine human rights and fundamental freedoms in Hong Kong by putting pressure on local authorities to arrest pro-democracy activists and disqualify pro-democracy electoral candidates," he added.

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International community concerned over Hong Kong security law 

The decisions were taken by the US in view of China imposing the new security law in Hong Kong snatching the human rights and freedom of the citizens in Hong Kong, China's discreet way of handling the COVID-19 crisis and not alarming the world about the severity of the crisis and its alleged involvement in espionage and intellectual property theft by way of Chinese students enrolment in American universities.

Hong Kong has been reeling under frequent protests since 2019 over the Chinese aggression jeopardising the autonomy of the city, its freedom and human rights, followed by the introduction and passage of the new security law which as touted by the world is sure to undermine the 'one country two systems' principle, eventually leading to the decimation of Hong Kong's autonomy stated under the Sino-British joint declaration of 1997.

This unilateral decision by the Chinese communist regime has deeply concerned the International community as the US, UK, Canada and Australia opposed the decision of China to impose the security law in Hong Kong.

In a joint statement, the four countries had said that direct imposition of national security legislation on Hong Kong by the Beijing authorities, rather than through Hong Kong's own institutions as provided for under Article 23 of the Basic Law, "would curtail the Hong Kong people's liberties, and in doing so, dramatically erode Hong Kong's autonomy and the system that made it so prosperous".