Death of Hong Kong? Asia’s top financial hub can’t be ‘killed off’ by Macau, Hainan or even Shanghai
- Whatever the international angst over the new security law, Beijing will not let anyone hinder Hong Kong’s growth, or dilute its contribution to China’s re-engagement with the global economy
Surrounded as we are by the grimmest array of global challenges assembled in our lifetimes – note the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development this week reported that we are facing the most severe economic recession in nearly a century with enormous damage expected to health, jobs and well-being – there is surely a case for an occasional escape into a little levity.
I know there are any number of such crackpot ideas that have been globally ventilated over the past 25 years, when Fortune magazine’s Louis Kraar first predicted the “Death of Hong Kong”: “the naked truth about Hong Kong’s future can be summed up in two words: it’s over,” he wrote almost 25 years ago to the day.
Kraar continued – just as eloquent as he was mistaken: “As Hong Kong becomes a captive colony of Beijing and increasingly begins to resemble just another mainland city, governed by corruption and political connections rather than the even-handed rule of law, it seems destined to become a global backwater.”
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White House says Beijing’s proposed national security law for Hong Kong could lead to US sanctions
