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What is the meaning of patriotism? Loyalty towards China or CCP? Or love our Hong Kong  society?
With unique historical and social background of Hong Kong, citizens consist a mixture of Western and Eastern cultural norms and values. Although Hong Kong was a colony of British for more than a hundred fifty years, and suppressed by the British government; but the British colonial government do introduce the democratic ideologies towards Hong Kong through the education system. Under the education system in Hong Kong, citizens have had learned and adopted the liberal democratic idea, such as having democratic political system, freedom of expression. Despite in legal status, Hong Kong is part of PRC, but indeed, within the Joint Declaration, Hong Kong citizens are able to have high degree of autonomy. Therefore, after the reunification in 1997, the Legislative Council is remaining elected by the citizens. Nevertheless, with Chinese government political invasion, the democratic political system is fading away from Hong Kong.

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Democracy often viewed as Western cultural norms and values; however, Kang basis the Confucianism ideology and compatible with the Western democratic values to develop the Wuxu Reform Movement. Regarding to Confucianism idea, in the Book of Rites (LiJi 禮記) mentioned in the Great Together (Datong world 大同世界):

大道之行也，天下為公。選賢與能，講信修睦。(孔子:禮運大同篇)

When the Great Way is practiced, the world is for the public. Those with virtue and those with ability are chosen and used. People value trustworthiness and cultivate harmony with each other.  (By Confucius in The Chapter of Great Harmony (Da Tong))

Mencius advocated in the social hierarchy, people ranked the highest, then the state, and the emperor ranked the lowest (“民為貴，社稷次之，君為輕。” ). From Mencius and Confucius ideologies, it did advocate the civil rights in their ideal society, Datong world. Although in the Confucianism ideologies did not mentioned the word of “democracy”; but indeed, Confucius mentioned the world is for the public and emphasised the value of benevolence and unity.

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Will Chinese government allow this kind of banner appear in China? After the 89 Democracy Movement, the party concern the state stability, by suppressing the freedom of expression and connection with foreign power to enlarge its political authorities.

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The Umbrella Movement in 2014 was one of the significant social movement in in Hong Kong. After 79 days of protests, protesters faced a failure of forcefully clearance by the government. Is Hong Kong society concern wealth rather than democracy?

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In December 2014, the Umbrella Movement, Hong Kong protests that had started on September 22, ended. Major roads, which had for three months been occupied by protesters, now were bustling again with traffic. Students returned to university empty-handed and suffrage-less. The protests, once lively with energy from the potential of tangible change, were extinguished without so much as an official statement from the Chinese government.

Why? The protest failed to hurt Hong Kong's economy.

During the protests, as many as 100,000 Hong Kong residents, young and old, student and worker alike, took to the streets. They protested living conditions, rent prices and more, but most of all, they protested a new ruling by a committee of People's Republic of China officials that reneged on previous promises of universal suffrage.

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Throughout October and November, despite the threat of physical violence, the people stood fast and kept watch over the empty streets. By December, however, the protests unsuccessfully concluded; the government had made no policy concessions.

Protests in Hong Kong are infrequent but large affairs: while political protests may occur only a handful of times a year compared to the tens of thousands of times in mainland China, they are much more populated. The largest protest in Hong Kong since its transfer to China in 1997 was the 2003* political protests that attracted 500,000 people, roughly 7 percent of the total population. These protests shut down the economy and caused millions of dollars worth of damages. Confronted with the slipping economy and large number of protesters, the government granted democratic concessions.

Looking at previous protests in Hong Kong, many of the most successful have managed to impact the economy. This intuitively makes sense: Hong Kong's stock index is one of the largest in Asia, and after last year's Shanghai index collapse, it remains vitally important to China. Similarly, if a protest threatens to hurt Hong Kong's economy, the government is more likely to concede policies to preserve economic prosperity and investor confidence.

By these standards, the 2014 Umbrella Movement had high potential. Public opinion was with the protesters, and even the international media picked up the palpable air of change on the streets. Even more, it appeared like the protest would impact Hong Kong's economy, thus spurring the government into precipitating policy concessions. The beginning of the protests coincided with the peak shopping months of the year. The Shanghai stock index, and stocks indexes throughout Asia, were volatile, so the government had an incentive to preserve economic stability in Hong Kong. As the protest numbers and media coverage of the Umbrella Movement grew, an ever-increasing number of financial and economic advisers warned that the protest could have dire impacts on the Hong Kong economy.

Yet despite the hype that the Umbrella Movement protests had the potential to impact a third of the Hong Kong economy by GDP, nothing changed. The government made no concessions, and eventually by December, the protest subsided.

The Hang Seng Index value fell just 6 percent during the Hong Kong protests, not the drastic 15 percent or 20 percent some market watchers had predicted. And while some analysts have attempted to draw a link between the Umbrella Movement protests and falling stock prices, others point out that the Hong Kong Stock Exchange nevertheless outperformed exchanges in Japan, Italy, and many developing markets.

Most surprisingly, considering that the protests were largely centered in retail areas, retail sales were actually up a few percentage points over the previous year and fit the general seasonal patterns. Similarly, tourism numbers were actually significantly higher during the protests, counter to what many outside observers predicted. Hotels were about 90 percent full throughout Hong Kong during the protests, the same as the year before, demonstrating that visitors were still arriving en masse.

The crux of Hong Kong's economy lies with its import and export economy, which in 2013 made up 25 percent of Hong Kong's GDP. During the Umbrella Movement protests, total trade, a conglomeration of exports and imports, was up almost five percent over the previous year. Data also suggests that total trade during the 2014 protests was even slightly higher than during the same period of 2015. Less surprisingly, the unemployment and underemployment rates held constant at 3.3 percent and 1.5 percent during the protests.

The data indicates that Hong Kong's economy during the protests was doing even better than a year before: simply put, the protests didn't have a perceptible effect on the economy. Thus, the rampant speculation that Hong Kong's service-sector economy would significantly suffer because of the protests was unfounded and false. Despite efforts by the Umbrella Movement to block off streets critical for Hong Kong's retail base, protesters were ultimately unable to apply pressure to the Chinese government through the local economy.

Why didn't the Umbrella Movement succeed?

The Umbrella Movement had two primary targets: the government and the economic sector. The government didn't budge on its policies, demonstrating that the Chinese government was able and willing to sit out a three-month protest. So unlike previous protests in Hong Kong that affected the economy, the lack of an even marginal effect on the economy was the main reason that the 2014 protest didn't succeed. Without affecting the retail and business sectors of Hong Kong's economy, the protesters could not pressure the Chinese government to change its policies; as long as the economy remained stable, Beijing had little incentive to grant suffrage to Hong Kong residents.

In light of Shanghai's massive June 2015 stock crash, during which the Chinese government was forced into a heavy-handed re-regulation of the market, the Chinese government will be even more loathe to give more independence to Hong Kong. Hong Kong's economy has demonstrated itself to be too valuable to lose, given its track record of stability and economic progress. Thus, the 2014 Hong Kong protests may have been one of the last opportunities for more independence in many years.

For future protests or attempts for suffrage, the business sector is key. The Chinese government can afford not to care about a widespread protest by students and the general public. To shift government policy, then, future protestors need to shake investors', visitors', and private citizen's confidence in the government's ability to control the economy. By rattling business owners, protestors could reach and thereby pressure policy change at the government level through its economic leaders, who would invariably have more bargaining power. Should a future protest actually cut into Hong Kong's economy, suffrage might finally be granted.
Tyler Y. Headley is at New York University Abu Dhabi, specializing in conflict and human rights. He has previously lived in Shanghai. Cole Tanigawa-Lau is an undergraduate and research assistant at NYU Abu Dhabi.
*Corrected from 2005. There were also protests in late 2005, but they were smaller in scale.

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Tyler Y. Headley and Cole Tanigawa-Lau , The Diplomat

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Why Did Hong Kong's Umbrella Movement Fail?

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In December 2014, the Umbrella Movement, Hong Kong protests that had started on September 22, ended. Major roads, which had for three months been occupied by protesters, now were bustling again with traffic. Students returned to university empty-handed and suffrage-less.

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With the China rising power, the global indicated China as a threat. Is this opinion basis on "Western" perspectives, or is just people want to continues the idea of "anti-communist" (Cold War)?

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Officials of the People's Republic certainly seem to agree. They talk of a rebalancing from the country's model of export-led, investment-heavy growth, towards a more developed model, focused on creating service sector jobs.

Oliver Hart, an economics professor at Harvard University, says: "As China becomes richer, it will resemble other countries: growth rates will fall; wages and consumption will rise; investment will fall."

Figures published last week seemed to confirm what everyone was thinking, and that China's rebalancing is already meaning that output picks up less quickly.

GDP rose at its slowest pace in a quarter of a century last year, by 6.9pc. The last time growth rates were so slow, the country was reeling from international sanctions after the Tiananmen Square massacre.

However, these headline figures can be misleading. China's progress in the intervening period has been nothing short of a growth miracle. More than 600m Chinese were pulled out of poverty from 1990 to 2010 alone.

As a result, China's lower growth rates do not mean that it is no longer a powerful economic force. All of China's growth in 1991 added $43bn (£30bn) to GDP, at a growth rate of 11.4pc, according to World Bank figures. Yet in 2014, a growth rate of just 9.1pc saw Chinese output rise by $864bn, more than 20 times what was added in 1991.

Speaking at Davos last week, Jiang Jianqing, chairman of Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, said the country was "still the locomotive for the world economy, contributing a quarter of world growth".

It is the dependency on China for demand that has panicked many investors. They anticipated even faster growth, relying on China to be the marginal consumer of practically every commodity, from oil to copper, as it guzzled resources to deliver industry-led growth.

As Chinese growth prospects fade, analysts have described it as facing a "hard landing", as policymakers struggle to manage the adjustments required. However, while such a deceleration might feel "hard" for commodity producers reliant on China, it could feel "soft" on the inside, for those enjoying the transition to a more advanced, higher-waged economic model.

Which countries would be worst affected by a "hard landing"?

Already it is the oil exporting nations suffering most, with the likes of Russia, as well as several Gulf and Latin American states forced to re-examine their spending plans.

While this slowdown had to happen eventually, the timing has been a surprise, perhaps because of the opacity with which Beijing's officials operate and the unreliability of economic data they release. The leaders are seemingly insistent on meeting GDP growth targets, in part because they are worried about unrest if they are abandoned.

Some have pointed out that it is convenient that the Chinese growth rate published for last year, at 6.9pc, was very close to the official target of 7pc.

Nearly a decade ago, Li Keqiang, now the Chinese premier, told a US ambassador that with the exception of a few figures, the country's statistics were "for reference only". This was especially true of the GDP statistics, he said. Li's private remarks, since leaked, confirmed what many already suspected.

James Barrineau, of asset management company Schroders, says that all this means that "for the first time in living memory, the country needs to learn to speak to markets". However, "this particular skill does not exist as yet".

The hurdles China faces "are large and self-created", he adds, including the problems with data and interventions in the economy and financial markets that are often poorly explained.

If the country's leaders will not learn, things may get worse before they can get better. So far, rebalancing rhetoric may not have been matched by the necessary action. George Magnus, UBS's former chief economist and now at Oxford University's China Centre, says that this rebalancing "is not really happening" as is often described.

"The change in the economy hasn't proceeded very quickly at all," Magnus argues, as China continues to rely on credit-fuelled investment to support growth. Chinese credit was growing at nearly twice the officially reported growth of the economy at the end of last year. It is quite possible that credit is growing at more than twice the pace of the actual growth rate.

The longer policymakers delay, the worse things might get for China in the longer term, yet they seem unwilling to accept that artificially propping up growth could be more damaging than taking an economic hit now. If this is unaddressed, "gradually the weight of debt in the economy will come down like a ton of bricks", says Magnus.

"The allocation of savings and investment has been driven by politics, because most of the financial system are state-owned enterprises (SOEs)," he explains. But making the financial system more resilient will require changes that can be politically difficult to accept.

Michael Every, a Rabobank analyst, highlights declining corporate profits as a reason for growth weakness. "There is a clear under-performance from SOEs, where profits were down 23pc year-on-year in November, whereas private firms saw profits rise 5pc," he says.

"There is still little sign of the kind of Schumpeterian reforms China needs," says Every, referring to the notion that good businesses should be able to push out bad.

Some have more faith in the country's leadership. Christine Lagarde, the International Monetary Fund's managing director, expressed her confidence in China's ability to get the job done last week. Speaking in Davos, she said the country's politicians had shown "an unbelievable determination and ability to deliver" other reforms.

Lagarde accepted that the kind of reforms China will need to make to move to the next stage of development are a "massive undertaking", but insisted it will happen.

Beijing's leaders do not yet seem to be paying attention. On the same day, Li Yuanchao, China's vice-president, last week said the government would "look after... most of the investors".

It has become hard for the administration of president Xi Jinping to move on with reform without compromising the primacy of the Communist party. Eventually, something will have to give.

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How China became the global threat everyone saw coming

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Officials of the People's Republic certainly seem to agree. They talk of a rebalancing from the country's model of export-led, investment-heavy growth, towards a more developed model, focused on creating service sector jobs. Oliver Hart, an economics professor at Harvard University, says: "As China becomes richer, it will resemble other countries: growth rates will fall; wages and consumption will rise; investment will fall."

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After 40 years of Mao' dead, but his is still impacting China in several aspects.

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Friday marked the 40th anniversary of the death of Mao Zedong, who founded the People's Republic of China in 1949 and ran it virtually uncontested until his death.

While his reputation was deeply tarnished by the chaos and destruction of the ultra-radical 1966-76 Cultural Revolution, subsequent generations have generally accepted the ruling Communist Party's official verdict that he was on balance 70 percent right and 30 percent wrong.

Here are some ways Mao's influence lingers in today's very-different China.

Still revered: Mao's birthplace in the village of Shaoshan in Hunan province receives millions of visitors a year, and his embalmed corpse lies within a hulking mausoleum in the center of sprawling Tiananmen Square in the heart of Beijing. His portrait still hangs from iconic Tiananmen Gate, from which he proclaimed the establishment of the new communist state on October 1, 1949, and his visage peers from every denomination of Chinese currency.

All are signs of how he has become a virtual symbol of state, even while in a modern industrial and increasingly capitalistic China that has veered greatly from his ideal of a radical communist state steeped in peasant virtues and egalitarian ideals.

Legacy of unity: Among Mao's key achievements was the welding of a fractious China into a unitary state by overthrowing Chiang Kai-shek's Nationalist government, defeating warlord factions and cementing control over the peripheral western regions of Tibet and Xinjiang. Mao's state has actually grown with the reabsorption in recent decades of the former British colony of Hong Kong and Portuguese colony of Macau. China has also moved aggressively to assert its claim to virtually the entire South China Sea, sparking frictions with its southern neighbors.

One territory remains outside Beijing's control, however: the self-governing island of Taiwan, to which Chiang's defeated forces retreated in 1949.

Party control: Mao advocated strict Communist Party control over all aspects of life, and while his totalitarian state is a thing of the past, the party maintains an iron grip on political power. The last major challenge it faced, the 1989 pro-democracy protests centered on Tiananmen Square, were brutally suppressed and remain a taboo subject.

China continues to imprison Nobel Peace Prize laureate Liu Xiaobo for co-authoring a call for ending the communist monopoly on power, and civic and legal groups outside party control face constant harassment and persecution. A roundup of activist lawyers in June 2015 has sent a chill through the activist community, and the prospects for a movement arising to oppose the party seem next to nil.

Powerful military: One of Mao's most famous dictums was that political power came from the barrel of a gun, and the People's Liberation Army remains the party's house guard, despite calls for it to shift loyalty to the government instead. In addition to retaining a monopoly on force at home, the PLA has become a growing force in regional and even global military affairs. With 2.3 million members, it is the world's largest standing military, although plans call for it to shrink by 300,000.

Years of double-digit-percentage increases in China's military budget - now the world's second-largest - have transformed the army into an increasingly high-tech and battle-proficient force, despite not having engaged in any major conflict since 1979.

Systematic weaknesses: Not all is smooth sailing. The party Mao bequeathed to his successors remains brittle and intolerant, opaque and exclusive, placing hundreds of millions of Chinese outside the decision-making process. Pent-up frustrations occasionally burst into episodes of unrest, although the massive security state has shown its ability to suppress them.

In addition, the nationalism unleashed by Mao may force the government to take hard-line positions that imperil its goal of being viewed as a responsible player in global society.

Economic tensions deriving from Mao's command economy also linger. In a move that might have pleased the revolutionary Mao, if not the later authoritarian leader, workers in China's bloated state industries are growing restive over layoffs and cutbacks at a time when overall economic growth, while still robust, is slowing.

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голос америки

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Mao's Influence Lingers in China, 40 Years After His Death

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Friday marked the 40th anniversary of the death of Mao Zedong, who founded the People's Republic of China in 1949 and ran it virtually uncontested until his death. While his reputation was deeply tarnished by the chaos and destruction of the ultra-radical 1966-76 Cultural Revolution, subsequent generations have generally accepted the ruling Communist Party's official verdict that he was on balance 70 percent right and 30 percent wrong.

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If the Chinese government is banning the christian missionaries to spread the gospel, how come the number of christianity is still growing??

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China has historically followed ancient religions like Buddhism and Taoism for about 2,000 years, according to China's State Council. But a recent map published by Reuters shows that the country's belief systems have become increasingly diverse.

The map, based on information from Professor Fanggang Yang, the director of the Center on Religion and Chinese Society at Purdue University, shows that China's monotheistic religions, including Islam and Christianity, are beginning to occupy a considerable amount of the country. Though Buddhism continues to occupy the majority of the south and south west regions, Protestant and Catholic followers have begun to occupy China's eastern regions, while western regions like Xinjiang and Gansu are predominately Muslim.

"Protestant Christianity has been the fastest growing religion in China," Yang writes in his essay, When Will China Become The World's Largest Christian Country? Though the estimates are varied,The Economist puts 100 million Christians in China as of last year.

According to the Council on Foreign Relations, that number could reach 160 million as early as 2025.

Despite anti-church sentiments, Yang expects growth as well.

"If the growth continues at the rate of 7 percent," Yang wrote , "Christians could be 32.5 percent of the Chinese population by 2040, and 66.7 percent by 2050."

This increase in Christianity has also lead to increased tension between Christians and Chinese Communist Party, Yang said.

According to the map, Chinese authorities in Huzhou removed a cross from a church despite the month long protesting efforts to protect their religious symbol. This is only one of the 1,200 crosses that have been removed in China "for the sake of safety and beauty" since late 2013, The Guardian reported.

Catholic leaders protested the removals, reported The Guardian, by disseminating an open letter to China's Christian population in late July.

Officials however believe that the major consensus favors the cross removal. "Generally speaking, the church staff and people are very supportive [of the removals]" an official from Zhejiang's ethnic and religious affairs bureau told Global Times - China's state-run newspaper.

The Uighurs, a mostly Muslim indigenous population in China, has also faced tension in Xinjiang. According to the BBC, the Uighurs and China's officials have had a long history of violence and restrictions. Last year, the Xinjiang government placed a ban on fasting during Ramadan, a holy month for practicing Muslims.

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This fascinating map shows the new religious breakdown in China

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China has historically followed ancient religions like Buddhism and Taoism for about 2,000 years, according to China's State Council. But a recent map published by Reuters shows that the country's belief systems have become increasingly diverse.

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The Chinese government is eliminating the Christianity aspect in the Chinese society. Why China need to remove the cross?

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China is facing accusations it's cracking down on the religious freedom of Christians.

One provincial government has systematically removed crosses from churches. Last month, a Protestant pastor was sentenced to 14 years in prison, convicted of financial crimes and also for illegally gathering people to disturb social order.

This battle over the freedom to worship has been ongoing for almost two years now, reports CBS News correspondent Seth Doane.

Cell-phone video released this week shows yet another cross being taken off a steeple.

The government in Zhejiang Province has removed - sometimes burned down - crosses from as many as 2,000 churches there, according to a U.S.-based religious activist group, "China Aid."

At times, the Christian faithful have protested what they call "illegal demolition," while one of their supporters, Christian lawyer Zhang Kai, was paraded on state TV in February expressing "remorse."

At the start of the government's campaign, an entire church was demolished. The official reason was for violation of "building codes."

China's ruling Communist Party is officially atheist. Technically, it does allow "freedom of religion," but those "approved" religions must worship under the supervision of those who are faithful, first and foremost to the state. So tens of millions of Christians meet underground in so-called "family churches."

One is set up in the tiny apartment of Xu Yonghai, who spent two years in prison after writing about church demolitions and the abuse of Christians. "We have up to 30 regular members at this church," Yonghai said, "but some of us are in jail from time to time."

When asked how many of the members have been detained, everyone in the room raised hands.

"There is no justice in this country," said one member, Guo Hong. "So we chose to believe in God and place our hope in his hands."

By some estimates, there are more Christians in China than registered members of the Communist Party, making theirs a very powerful voice. CBS News reached out to religious affairs authorities for some sort of explanation or comment, but did not hear back.

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Chinese government accused of burning crosses in Christian crackdown

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China is facing accusations it's cracking down on the religious freedom of Christians. One provincial government has systematically removed crosses from churches. Last month, a Protestant pastor was sentenced to 14 years in prison, convicted of financial crimes and also for illegally gathering people to disturb social order.

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2016

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Ruled by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) for more than six decades, China remains an authoritarian state, one that systematically curtails a wide range of fundamental human rights, including freedom of expression, association, assembly, and religion. While there were a few modest positive developments in 2015-authorities, for example, reduced the number of crimes eligible for the death penalty from 55 to 46 and issued directives guaranteeing students with disabilities "reasonable accommodation" in university entrance exams-the trend for human rights under President Xi Jinping continued in a decidedly negative direction.

Senior Chinese leaders, perceiving a threat to their power, now explicitly reject the universality of human rights, characterizing these ideas as "foreign infiltration," and penalizing those who promote them. Freedoms of expression and religion, already limited, were hit particularly hard in 2015 by several restrictive new measures.

Individuals and groups who have fought hard in the past decade for human rights gains were the clearest casualties of an aggressive campaign against peaceful dissent, their treatment starkly contrasting with President Xi's vow to promote "rule of law." Between July and September, about 280 human rights lawyers and activists were briefly detained and interrogated across the country. About 40 remain in custody, most in secret locations without access to lawyers or family, some beyond the legal time limits; most have been accused of being part of a "major criminal gang" that "seriously disrupts public order." The government has shut down or detained staff of a number of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and arrested and imprisoned many activists.

The government also proposed or passed laws on state security, cybersecurity, counterterrorism, and the management of foreign NGOs; these laws conflate peaceful criticism of the state with threats to national security. For example, the second draft of the Foreign Non-Governmental Organizations Management Law imposes an onerous supervisory framework and restrictions on staffing and operations of these organizations, and gives police an expansive role in approving and monitoring their work. Although close scrutiny of NGOs is not new for a government that has long labeled peaceful criticism as a threat to state power, the proliferation of laws authorizing such intrusion provides officials with even more ammunition to intimidate or punish activists.

President Xi's domestically popular anti-corruption campaign continues to feature prosecutions that violate the right to a fair trial. In June, former security czar Zhou Yongkang was given a life sentence following a closed-door trial and months of unlawful and secret detention. At the same time, anti-corruption activists involved in the New Citizens Movement, including legal scholar Xu Zhiyong, continue to languish in jail.

Human Rights Defenders

Activists seeking to defend human rights have faced a surge in reprisals under Xi, at times enduring arbitrary detention, enforced disappearance, politicized prosecutions, and torture by authorities in response to their work.

Various NGOs have been closed and their staff detained on bogus charges. In late 2014, authorities detained Guo Yushan and He Zhengjun, the director and administrative manager of the prominent Beijing-based public policy think tank, Transition Institute, accusing them of "illegal business operations;" they were released on bail in September 2015. In June, two former directors of Zhengzhou Yirenping, a group affiliated with the prominent anti-discrimination organization Beijing Yirenping, were taken into custody. They were subsequently released, but a government spokesperson vowed to "punish" Yirenping for unspecified "unlawful activities." Other NGOs, even lesser-known ones or ones working on subjects considered less politically sensitive, such as the Shenzhen Christian Guan'ai Home for the Homeless, faced closure and arrests.

In addition to the nationwide round-up of about 280 lawyers and activists in 2015, human rights lawyers were increasingly subject to physical assault, including by court officials. In August, lawyer Zhang Kai was detained for providing legal advice to Christians in Zhejiang Province who had resisted the authorities' forced removal of crosses on church buildings. Other lawyers, including Pu Zhiqiang and Tang Jingling, detained in separate cases since May 2014, remain in custody pending trial or verdict.

The government has increasingly used vague public order charges to silence human rights defenders. At time of writing, Guo Feixiong, a prominent Guangdong activist, was still awaiting a verdict after being tried in November 2014 for "gathering crowds to disturb social order."

A number of activists, including elderly journalist Gao Yu, Pu Zhiqiang, Uighur scholar Ilham Tohti, and anti-corruption activist Liu Ping, continue to be detained or imprisoned without adequate medical care.

Freedom of Expression

The Chinese government tightly restricts freedom of expression through censorship and punishments. While the Internet has offered a marginally freer space, the government censors politically unacceptable information through means such as the "Great Firewall." Despite media censorship, journalists and editors have at times pushed the limits of acceptable expression.

In 2015, government agencies such as the State Internet Information Office issued multiple new directives, including tightened restrictions over the use of usernames and avatars, and requirements that writers of online literature register with their real names. The government has also shut down or restricted access to Virtual Private Networks (VPNs), which many users depend on to gain access to content otherwise blocked to users inside the country.

In March, authorities also deployed a new cyber weapon, the "Great Cannon," to disrupt the services of GreatFire.org, an organization that has worked to undermine China's censorship. In July, the government published a draft cybersecurity law that will requires domestic and foreign Internet companies to practice censorship, register users' real names, localize data, and aid government surveillance. In August, the government announced that it would station police in major Internet companies to more effectively prevent "spreading rumors" online.

In January 2015, Education Minister Yuan Guiren told universities to ban teaching materials that promote Western values and censor speech constituting "attack and slander against the Party."

In April, prominent journalist Gao Yu was sentenced to seven years in prison for allegedly leaking an internal CCP document calling for greater censorship of liberal and reformist ideas. She was forced to confess, and the confession was aired on state TV long before criminal investigations against her ran their course.

Financial reporting has often appeared less tendentious than political journalism. But in August, the government took the alarming step of detaining Wang Xiaolu, a financial reporter, for having written about the authorities' deliberations over withdrawing stabilizing measures in response to the sharp declines in the Chinese stock market crash in June and July.

Also in August, the Urumqi government tried two brothers of Shohret Hoshur of Radio Free Asia, a reporter based in the United States, on state security charges; the brothers likely were being punished for Hoshur's critical reporting on conditions in Xinjiang, a sensitive minority region in western China. In September, a computer programmer was sentenced to 12 years in prison for placing anti-CCP slogans on TV.

Women's Rights

While the CCP is rhetorically committed to gender equality, its lack of respect for human rights means that women continue to face systemic discrimination on issues ranging from employment to sexual harassment. Family planning policies, which control the number and spacing of children people can have, continue to impose severe restrictions on women's reproductive freedoms. In October, authorities announced an end to its decades-old "one-child" policy; couples may now have two children.

In March, at least 10 women's rights activists were taken into custody by police for plans to post signs and distribute leaflets to raise awareness about sexual harassment in three Chinese cities. Five were soon released, but the others were held for 37 days on charges of "picking quarrels," sparking a widespread international outcry. Though the five were released on bail, continuing restrictions on their movements and police harassment led them to close their organization, the Weizhiming Women's Center in Hangzhou.

In March, the Supreme People's Court and other agencies issued instructions requiring judges to consider domestic violence as a mitigating circumstance in criminal cases against victims of such violence. In August, China's legislature reviewed a draft of the long-awaited Law against Domestic Violence. While a step in the right direction, the draft falls short of international standards, particularly in its definition of domestic violence. Cases of domestic violence in which local authorities fail to respond appropriately continue to occur with worrying regularity. In July, for example, a woman was killed by her husband during a mediation session in a police station.

Freedom of Religion

The government restricts religious practice to five officially recognized religions and only in officially approved religious premises. The government audits the activities, employee details, and financial records of religious bodies, and retains control over religious personnel appointments, publications, and seminary applications.

In 2015, authorities continued their campaign to remove crosses from churches, and in some cases demolished entire churches in Zhejiang Province, considered the heartland of Chinese Christianity. The campaign is publicly described as an effort to remove "illegal structures" that do not comply with zoning requirements, but according to an internal provincial directive, it is designed to reduce the prominence of Christianity in the region.

At least a hundred Christians have reportedly been briefly detained for resisting the demolitions since the start of the campaign in early 2014. At least one church leader, Huang Yizi, was convicted of "gathering crowds to disturb social order" and in March given one year in jail for speaking out against the removals.

In June, a top CCP official told religious leaders that "hostile forces" are using religion to infiltrate China, and that they must "Sinicize religion" to ensure that religious worship contributes to national unity.

The government classifies many religious groups outside its control as "evil cults," such as Falungong, and membership alone can lead to criminal and extra-legal punishments. Another group, Buddhist sect Huazang Dharma, has been targeted for arrests, and its leader, Wu Zeheng, was sentenced to life in prison in October for "using cults to sabotage law enforcement," extortion, and other charges.

In August, the National People's Congress approved proposed changes to article 300 of the Criminal Law, which punishes individuals for organizing and participating in cults. The potential penalty range has been lengthened to include life imprisonment.

Disability Rights

China ratified the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) in 2008, but persons with disabilities continue to face barriers and discrimination, including lack of access to education.

More students with low vision and blindness took the national university entrance exams, or gaokao, this year, following the Education Ministry's 2014 decision to make Braille and electronic versions available. In April, the ministry also promulgated new regulations requiring exam administrators to provide "one or more" forms of "reasonable accommodation," such as extending the time allowed for completing exams and providing sign language services to students with disabilities taking the gaokao. Given that other laws and regulations do not clearly require education institutions to provide such students with "reasonable accommodation" as defined in the CPRD, the April decision is a significant step forward.

Regulations drafted in 2013 on access to education for people with disabilities have still not been adopted. Official guidelines continue to allow universities to deny enrollment in certain subjects if the applicants have certain disabilities. Consequently, although more students with disabilities can now take the gaokao, many universities continue to deny them entry to their chosen field of study or entry to the university altogether.

The 2013 Mental Health Law stipulates that treatment and hospitalization should be voluntary except in cases where individuals with severe mental health conditions pose a danger to, or have harmed, themselves or others. In April, however, a Shanghai court ruled against Xu Wei, the first patient ever to invoke the law to challenge his confinement. Xu Wei has been held against his will for over a decade for schizophrenia.

Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity

Homosexuality was decriminalized in 1997 and removed from an official list of mental illnesses in 2001. There is still no law protecting people from discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity, however, and there is no legal recognition of same-sex partnership.

A 2014 report by a Chinese lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) organization revealed that very few Chinese textbooks portray LGBT people using objective and non-discriminatory language.

In what could be a sign of growing social acceptance of same-sex relationships, Chinese social media lit up with discussion and debate following the June US Supreme Court decision legalizing same-sex marriage in the US. In July, a Sun Yat-Sen University student donned a rainbow flag at a graduation ceremony and received gestures of support from the chancellor; state media widely covered the story.

LGBT groups and individuals continue to file lawsuits that challenge discrimination. In April, a man sued his Shenzhen employer for firing him after a video revealing his sexuality went viral online. In August, a university student in Guangdong Province sued the provincial education department for officially approved textbooks that depict homosexuality as an illness.

Tibet

The 6th Tibet Work Forum meeting in late August, held to determine central government policy for the region for years to come, emphasized the imperatives of security and "stability," but authorities failed to address systematic ethnic and religious discrimination and restrictions, or the profound socioeconomic changes brought by massive re-housing and resettlement campaigns in which Tibetans were compelled to participate.

Central government authorities continue to deploy officials in villages and monasteries and have expanded surveillance mechanisms to the grassroots level, a development which appears to have contributed to more frequent arrests of local community leaders, environmental activists, villagers involved in social and cultural activities, and writers and singers whose works are considered sensitive.

In July, Tenzin Delek Rinpoche-one of Tibet's highest-profile political prisoners-died in detention. In violation of the relevant regulations, authorities refused to release his body or investigate the circumstances of his death. Also in July, Lobsang Yeshe, a village head imprisoned for his role in a local anti-mining protest in May 2014, died in prison following reports that he had been mistreated. Another high profile prisoner, a young Lhasa NGO worker Tenzin Choedrak, died in December, two days after he was abruptly released early from detention.

Protests, particularly against mining and land acquisition, continue despite threats from local authorities. Security forces beat and arrested peaceful protestors in Chamdo in April and in Gannan in June. Following mass protests against mining in a supposedly protected part of Qinghai in 2014, mining operations were reportedly closed down, although the reasons for this remain unclear. After public outcry over corruption in the school exam system, authorities in the Tibet Autonomous Region and Qinghai introduced tighter regulations and prosecuted offenders.

Seven more Tibetans self-immolated in 2015, bringing the total since 2009 to 143.

Xinjiang

Xinjiang, home to 10 million Uighurs, continues to be the site of pervasive discrimination, repression, and restrictions on fundamental human rights. Opposition to central and local policies has been expressed in peaceful protests, but also through violent incidents such as bombings, though details about both protests and violence are often scant as authorities keep an especially tight hold over information in Xinjiang.

Chinese authorities in 2015 continued the counterterrorism campaign they launched in Xinjiang in mid-2014, deploying more security forces to the region, and implementing new laws and regulations that further criminalize dissent and restrict religious practice for the region's Muslim ethnic Uighur population. Since mid-2014, authorities have detained, arrested, or killed increasing numbers of Uighurs alleged by police to have been involved in illegal or terrorist activities, but the authorities' claims are impossible to verify independently. In June, a group of people attacked a police traffic checkpoint in Kashgar with small bombs and knives. Between 18 and 28 people reportedly died, including 15 suspects killed by police as well as several bystanders.

Xinjiang authorities promulgated comprehensive yet vaguely worded new religious affairs regulations in January. Those prohibit "extremist" attire and ban "activities that damage the physical and mental health of citizens." In recent years, authorities have used similar official and unofficial directives to discourage or even ban civil servants, teachers, and students from fasting during Ramadan. In March, a Hotan court convicted 25 Uighurs of "endangering state security" for their participation in "illegal" religious studies-in this case, private religious classes.

Hong Kong

Although Hong Kong is guaranteed autonomy in all matters other than foreign affairs and defense, and enjoys an independent judiciary and other civil liberties, Beijing appears to be encroaching on the rights to political participation, expression, and assembly there.

In June, Hong Kong's legislature rejected a Beijing-backed proposed electoral reform package for the region's chief executive. The proposal, which would expand the franchise but allow a Beijing-dominated nominating committee to screen out candidates it did not like, was opposed by many Hong Kong residents and in 2014 had sparked the months-long "Umbrella Movement" protests.

About 1,000 people were arrested in connection with the "Umbrella Movement," though most were released without being prosecuted. Authorities have charged student leader Joshua Wong Chi-fung, among others, with "unlawful assembly, and inciting others to take part in an unlawful assembly," despite those laws' incompatibility with international freedom of assembly standards. The Independent Police Complaints Council said it had received 159 complaints from demonstrators alleging police assault and abuse that it deemed "required investigation," but the only police who had been arrested at time of writing were police caught on film beating pro-democracy protester Ken Tsang.

Concerns about freedom of expression in Hong Kong persist, especially for media seen as critical of Beijing. In January, an attacker threw a Molotov cocktail outside the residence of pro-democracy media owner Jimmy Lai. No one was injured, but no one was arrested. In August, two assailants of former Mingpao editor Kevin Lau Chun-to were sentenced; one admitted that they had been paid to stab Lau to "teach him a lesson."

In July, Reverend Philip Woo Siu-hok was summoned to Shenzhen by religious affairs authorities to warn him against preaching to mainlanders who come to Hong Kong.

Key International Actors

Few governments exerted any substantial pressure on China over its worsening human rights record in 2015, instead limiting their interventions to bilateral human rights dialogues with the Chinese government and occasional public expressions of concern.

Some, such as the United Kingdom, went so far as to urge legislators in Hong Kong to accept Beijing's undemocratic electoral package, arguing that "something is better than nothing." New European Union High Representative for Foreign and Security Policy Federica Mogherini failed to publicly raise human rights abuses with Chinese leaders at a summit in May, as did US President Barack Obama during a state visit by Xi in September.

A remarkable diversity of governments, business and trade associations, universities, and other international organizations voiced concern through statements and submissions to the National People's Congress regarding China's draft foreign NGO management law after a second draft of the law was made public in May.

In August, the International Olympic Committee awarded Beijing the 2022 Winter Olympic Games despite international concerns about the current crackdown on rights and the lack of accountability for human rights abuses that accompanied, and in important respects were fueled by, China's preparations for the 2008 Summer Olympic Games in Beijing.

Foreign Policy

Under the leadership of Xi Jinping, China continues to aggressively advance its territorial claims in Asia, causing particular alarm by building structures on small reefs in the South China Seas that could one day accommodate military outposts. At the Security Council, China joined Russia in May 2014 in vetoing a resolution that would have referred the situation in Syria to the International Criminal Court (ICC); in December, it tried to block discussion of the human rights situation in North Korea.

China continues to allow United Nations rapporteurs to visit on a highly selective basis; the rapporteurs on the freedom of religion, freedom of peaceful assembly and association, human rights defenders, health, extrajudicial executions, independence of judges and lawyers, and the freedom from torture all continue to await a response to their requests to visit. While not playing a visibly assertive role at the UN Human Rights Council, China continues to act as a spoiler, blocking greater scrutiny of human rights situations in other countries, including Belarus, Iran, North Korea, Syria, and Ukraine.

Concerns continued to be raised regarding reprisals against Chinese citizens participating in UN processes. The UN secretary-general noted that China had still not replied to communications about the death in custody of human rights defender Cao Shunli, who had been campaigning for greater civil society participation in the UN's universal periodic review, and both the UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women and Committee against Torture (CAT) expressed concern at attempts to limit civil society participation in the treaty body reviews. Chinese officials provided few meaningful answers during its November CAT review.

The Chinese government marked the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II with a massive parade in Beijing. Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, who is wanted by the ICC for genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity, attended at Beijing's invitation.

Beijing stepped up pressure on other governments to return allegedly corrupt officials to China; at least a dozen governments with politicized judicial systems complied and returned several dozen in 2015. China also pressured its neighbors to forcibly return refugees from China. In July, shortly after it had allowed nearly 170 Uighur women and children to resettle in Turkey after more than a year in detention, Thailand forcibly repatriated nearly 100 Uighur men to China, placing them at grave risk of imprisonment and torture.

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World Report 2016: Rights Trends in China

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Ruled by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) for more than six decades, China remains an authoritarian state, one that systematically curtails a wide range of fundamental human rights, including freedom of expression, association, assembly, and religion.