February
2025
The United Kingdom has seen a recent rise in transnational repression activities targeting Hong Kong activists. London residents have reported receiving letters in English asking them to report on U.K.-based activist Tony Chung and HKDC’s Senior International Advocacy Associate Carmen Lau, both of which list addresses and personal details of the activists in question. The letters, which call for “information on [these] wanted person[s]” and ask recipients to help “take [them] to [the] Chinese embassy,” list a Hong Kong police contact email and phone number. Spokespeople from the HKSAR government and the Chinese Embassy in London have neither confirmed or denied their involvement in the issuance of these letters, while Conservative MP Chris Philp condemned the bounties as a “gross infringement of the liberty of the individuals concerned” and an “affront to British sovereignty.”
Summary
These recent attempts to harass and target activists in the U.K. follow not only recent issuances of HK$1 million bounties against Hong Kong democracy leaders, but also the uncovering of the alleged involvement of employees from the London-based Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office (HKETO) in an espionage scheme targeting Hong Kongers in the U.K. The intensification of transnational repression efforts by the Chinese government draws further attention to the pattern of foreign interference in the U.K., which may influence the debate over a planned Chinese “super-embassy” in London. Looking across the Atlantic, these recent targetings of U.K.-based activists may portend a corresponding rise in transnational repression led by the U.S. HKETOs, which have a long history of spending heavily to influence national and local politics.
Analysis
