Harsh times ahead for critics as protection of regime made the main priority: analysts
South China Morning Post
Verna Yu
July 3, 2015
Journalist Gao Yu has been sentenced to seven years in jail for ‘leaking state secrets abroad’. Analysts say the new law will make it easier for the state to take actions against its ‘enemies’ on the pretext of national security. Photo: Kyodo
The sweeping national security law passed on Wednesday will make it easier for law enforcers to justify crackdowns on dissent as criticism of the government could be construed as a threat to national security, scholars and rights groups warn.
The law defines national security as the protection of a broad range of terms, from cultural and ideological issues to cyber security and China’s interests in space. But analysts said the law, in its preamble, stated that safeguarding the political regime ranked above sovereignty, national unification, territorial integrity and people’s welfare.
It is this prioritisation that alarms analysts, who said they feared that activities perceived to be a threat to the Communist Party would now be interpreted as a threat to national security.
“It says the protection of party rule is national security, so anything that threatens party rule will be handled as a national security issue,” said Nicholas Bequelin, East Asia director of Amnesty International.
Bequelin believes the new law will enable the police to mobilise national security clauses to prevent activists or government critics being involved in activities, and will help the authorities stigmatise these people in the eyes of the public.
“If a person is a threat to national security, people won’t have a lot of sympathy [for him],” he said.
Eva Pils, a China expert at King’s College London, said the national security law would legalise actions against the regime’s “enemies” that until now had been unlawful, such as illegal detention and torture, in the name of protecting national security. “[These] can now more easily be characterised as a form of ‘law enforcement’,” she said.
Political commentator Ching Cheong gave the example of the case of detained journalist Gao Yu, who was sentenced to seven years in jail for leaking a party document on the charge that she “leaked state secrets abroad”. Her lawyers argued in court that party secrets should not constitute state secrets.
“But under this law, which says the party’s security is state security, you can’t even use this defence anymore,” Ching said.
Scholars and rights groups are concerned that the new law defines “national security” in such broad terms, contrary to international laws that require specific threats to be narrowly defined.
“It is unclear what kind of specific actions would be construed as endangering state security,” said Maya Wang, a China researcher for the US-based Human Rights Watch.
Pils was also concerned that the law enabled “citizens and organisations” other than the designated state securities to “assist” in protecting national security – which could lead to abuses without specific checks and balances in the clauses to safeguard citizens’ rights.
