2020 has been eventful for Hong Kong, to say the least. From the world’s perspective, Hong Kong has shifted drastically throughout this year.

At the beginning of the year, Europe saw Hong Kong still being autonomous and “one country, two systems” still functioning. Although the Movement in 2019 showed major flaws of the system, Europe still perceived it was “business as usual” in Hong Kong, and it was not up to foreign powers to intervene in an internal conflict in Hong Kong. Even if the Extradition Bill was to jeopardize the safety of expatriates from Europe in the city, the continental countries merely expressed concerns and called for dialogues between the society and the government in their statements. Europe adopted a “wait-and-see” attitude towards China and the SAR. On the one hand, they did not want to risk ruining the economic ties with China; on the other hand, they were concerned about how the situation might evolve in the city. Nevertheless, they were not highly motivated to take concrete actions against the Hong Kong government and China.

Confronted with the COVID-19 pandemic, the countries started to realize the issue of Hong Kong was a symptom of a bigger problem—China expanding against all odds in the world. At the beginning of this public health crisis, Europe found itself lacking in medical supplies like PPE (personal protective equipment) and medical masks, and realized that they are highly dependent on certain supplies from China that are of critical importance. They then realized China weights politics over everything, even lives of millions of people. Taiwan was very successful in controlling the spread of the virus at an early stage, and a lot of countries would love to learn from Taiwan. But under China’s influence, WTO was reluctant to let Taiwan make use of its platforms to share its experience with other countries in defeating the virus. And when both Taiwan and China donated medical supplies to Europe, its silence concerning Taiwan’s donations stood in stark contrast to its vocal gratitude to China. At the same time, China launched a huge propaganda campaign across the world, praising itself for being the savior of the world in the crisis and demanding gratitude from the European countries. Instead of taking up the responsibility for covering up the virus outbreak in the first place, China turned to blame the US for causing the epidemic and slam every country for criticizing China. Europe then learned China’s wolf-warrior approach is one-size-fits-all diplomatic tactics and propaganda.

While the world was busy combating the impact of the virus, Beijing implemented the National Security Law in Hong Kong, which completely changed Europe’s perspective on the city. Europe saw the act of bypassing the city’s legislature to directly insert the law into Annex 3 of the Basic Law as a violation of the Sino-British Joint Declaration, an infringement of human rights. It was the final nail in the coffin for “one country, two systems”. The implementation of the law shocked Europe. They came to acknowledge that Hong Kong will be easily turned into another Tibet or East Turkestan. Europe voiced serious concerns, and many of them retreated from extradition agreements with Hong Kong in the following months. As more Hong Kong activists went into exile and more arrests happened on a daily basis in the city, Europe became more aware of their role in the situation. Within Europe, there have been more reports and findings on how China is infiltrating Europe through academic funding and investment and so on. But there are yet to be any concrete actions to be taken.

Europe is still reluctant to see the current international dynamics as a new cold war. They are willing to bury their heads in the sand and perceive the Hong Kong issue as an “internal affair” between Beijing and Hong Kong and they will not speak up for Hong Kong at the risk of trade and economic benefits. Hong Kong is now being treated as a victim of Beijing, while Europe is a Hongkongers sympathizer who would not, however, take any risk to stand up for the rights and values they believe to be universal. It is expected that in the coming months, Europe will remain silent about Hong Kong in order to secure an investment deal with China and focus on local economic recovery. Europe would do its best to buying more time before having to take a stand and admit that Hong Kong is not just a symptom of the China problem, but also the new Berlin under the new cold war. Since Beijing is drastically speeding up the process of gaining full control over Hong Kong while expanding its influence into the world. The day that Europe finally realizes they must take a stand may come sooner than we thought.

(Glacier Kwong, born and raised in Hong Kong, became a digital rights and political activist at the age of 15. She is currently pursuing her PhD in Law and working on the course for Hong Kong in Germany. Her work has been published on Washington Post, TIME, etc.)

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