China warns ‘Five Eyes’ against interference in Hong Kong affairs

China warns Five Eyes’: China sends out a loud and clear message to the ‘Five Eyes’ alliance group to abstain from interfering in its internal affairs, specifically with regard to supporting Hong Kong pro-democracy lawmakers. Last week, on the orders of Chinese government, Hong Kong expelled four of its pro-democracy lawmakers from legislature after Beijing passed a resolution enabling the Hong Kong government to disqualify elected legislators, who appeared to be a threat to its national security.

On Wednesday, the Five Eyes intelligence-sharing group, a group comprising of five nations including Australia, Britain, Canada, New Zealand and the United States, slammed the new rules imposed by the Chinese regime, for it appeared to be direct attempt to bulldoze Hong Kong’s pro-democracy dream. The group was formed during the Cold War, mainly to monitor the activities of USSR and its allies.

The five nations backed Hong Kong, a former British colony, in its campaign to silence critics and asked the Chinese authorities to reverse course. The territory was handed over to China by the British government in 1997 on the condition of reinstating its autonomy. 

“We urge the Chinese central authorities to re-consider their actions against Hong Kong’s elected legislature and immediately reinstate the Legislative Council members,” foreign ministers from Australia, Britain, Canada, New Zealand and the United States said in a statement. The nations criticised Beijing of sabotaging the rights Hong Kongers to elect their representatives.

Besides, as a mark of revolt against Beijing’s new order, all of Hong Kong’s pro-democracy lawmakers gave in their resignation. The removal of the four lawmakers was seen by many as China’s attempt to curb Hong Kong’s freedom.

Much irked by the foreign leaders for, what it felt like, upending China’s internal state of affairs as Beijing claimed that Hong Kong part of its territory and did not support the idea of complete democracy in an otherwise semi-autonomous state. 

As a response against the external meddling, Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian shared a well-articulated message at a daily media conference in Beijing on Thursday. He said that the Five Eyes alliance should be careful as if they tried to harm China’s sovereignty, security or development interests, “their eyes will be plucked out.”

He said, “The Chinese never make trouble and are never afraid of anything” and added that it did not “matter if they had five or 10 eyes”.