At least 151 died as flames engulfed high-rise towers at Hong Kong’s Wang Fuk Court housing complex last week. The official response shows how this once free city is becoming more like mainland China by the day.
Authorities are seeking to chill speech related to the fire. Several civil-society figures had planned to hold a news conference Tuesday to discuss the response to the blaze. But the event was cancelled after one participant, solicitor Bruce Liu, was “invited to a meeting” with national-security police, the local press reports. Mr. Liu, former chair of the pro-democracy Association for Democracy and People’s Livelihood, reportedly left the police station later Tuesday.
Police on Saturday also detained student Miles Kwan, who called for a probe into any conflicts of interest or regulatory neglect that contributed to the fire, among other demands in a petition to the government. Our sources say he’s since been released.
The Committee for Freedom in Hong Kong Foundation says national-security authorities arrested former pro-democracy district councillor Kenneth Cheung after he called for an independent probe. Another unnamed volunteer was reportedly arrested for using the fire to incite hatred of the government, which means merely criticizing the government.
Hong Kongers have legitimate questions about what went so lethally awry. Before the blaze, residents of Wang Fuk Court had repeatedly raised safety concerns, and authorities now say some of the protective mesh around the buildings failed to meet flame-retardant standards. Other reports describe flammable construction materials and faulty alarms.
A decade ago the scrappy reporters at the Apple Daily newspaper might have followed up on residents’ complaints and exposed wrongdoing before tragedy struck. But authorities arrested Apple Daily’s founder Jimmy Lai in 2020 on national-security charges and later forced the paper’s closure. Mr. Lai has been in prison on trumped-up charges ever since.
Authorities have also made at least 13 non-speech arrests in relation to the fire, including the bosses of a construction company that a police superintendent called “grossly negligent.” Perhaps they are liable in some way, but the rapid arrests have a round-up-the-usual-suspects quality. That’s how authoritarian regimes respond when they need a scapegoat for the public to blame.
There’s early evidence of government shortcomings. Hong Kong’s Labor Department had told Wang Fuk Court residents that the fire risks were “relatively low,” Reuters reports. Hong Kong’s Fire Services Department conducts inspections and can take enforcement actions regarding fire safety at construction sites. Where were they?
By the way, the fire department is a subordinate agency of Hong Kong’s Security Bureau, and the bureau’s Secretary is Chris Tang, who is also in charge of implementing the national-security law that outlaws dissent. On Saturday Beijing warned “anti-China and pro-chaos elements who attempt to ‘use disasters to disrupt Hong Kong’” would be “severely punished” under the same law. Hong Kongers have little recourse as authorities tolerate neither scrutiny nor criticism.
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