Former Hong Kong lawmaker Christopher Hui, who arrived in the United Kingdom to begin his life in exile, has revealed a breakthrough after all of his family’s bank accounts, which have also been left in Hong Kong, were frozen. On Sunday, the family’s HSBC bank accounts have all been unfrozen, and his own accounts have been partially unfrozen, Koh revealed on Facebook, U.S. time. He said the incident shows that banks can freeze people’s assets at will due to political pressure, which seriously impacts the credibility of Hong Kong’s banking and financial system.
Recently, Mr. Hsu made public the freezing of his bank accounts and those of his family, questioning the “obvious political retaliation by the regime for economic oppression and the use of guilt by association to suppress my family’s voice of opposition.
He said on Facebook that the regime does not have the guts to disclose whether or not it is investigating his family, and that it is covering up for police abuses. He wrote, “The regime thinks it can suppress dissent, but doesn’t realize that it’s doing so by directly undermining the world’s confidence in Hong Kong’s banking system and judicial system, and it’s self-seeking.”
The incident developed to (Sunday) December 6, Hong Kong Police Commissioner Tang Bing-keung on a Hong Kong TV program on the Hong Kong TVB, not to name Xu Zhifeng “absconded without conscience”. Tang Bingqiang revealed, will follow the crowdfunding whether to make false statements, and crowdfunding is illegal and other directions for investigation.
The Hong Kong police issued a statement at around 7:30 p.m. on the same day, without naming a Hong Kong resident who absconded overseas and whose bank account was frozen. It is alleged that the person is suspected of embezzling funds obtained through an online crowdfunding campaign and using a relative’s account to handle the funds, and that the person is also suspected of colluding with foreign powers to endanger national security. The police are looking for the fugitive, tracing the money and freezing the account in the direction of allegedly violating the “National Security Law of Hong Kong” and money laundering.
About an hour later, Xu Zhifeng discovered that all of his family’s HSBC accounts had been unblocked, and his own account had been partially unblocked as well.
He stated on Facebook that his family had immediately transferred their savings to a safe place due to their complete distrust of HSBC in Hong Kong. He went on to say that this incident is extremely serious, reflecting the fact that under the National Security Law, banks can freeze citizens’ assets at will due to political pressure, which seriously impacts the credibility of Hong Kong’s banking and financial system and violates the protection of private property of citizens and legal persons under the Hong Kong Basic Law.
He called on local and international financial regulators to conduct a thorough investigation into the incident and to severely punish the law enforcement officers and bank managers who abused their power.
On the Facebook page of Xu Zhifeng, many netizens who support his exile analyzed the incident of the police freezing his family’s bank accounts, saying that it was like the Chinese government’s treatment of dissidents, which implicates the entire family. One netizen, who identified himself as Ling Ip, wrote: “(The Hong Kong government) should know that it has gone too far, but it’s useless to impose sanctions.
Many netizens have left online comments stating that they will voluntarily withdraw all their deposits and cancel their accounts at HSBC on Monday as a sign of protest. The netizens explained in detail how to open offshore accounts overseas to transfer funds and ensure that their assets are safe and will not be frozen at the whim of the government.
Xu Zhifeng declined netizens’ suggestion of crowdfunding for his immediate needs in exile, saying that he did not have to worry about his livelihood and that he had friends in the UK to rely on for a short time. He wrote: “I have never been very cautious and would never raise money for myself unless I was doing something for Hong Kong or for the public. I take everyone’s kindness to heart. “
He reiterated that the funds for the crowdfunding campaign he initiated last year for a private prosecution against police brutality had never been deposited in full in the law firm’s bank account, that the audit report had been fully disclosed, and that the funds had nothing to do with his personal accounts or those of his family, to set the record straight.
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