(ZENIT News / Hong Kong, 07.04.2024).- With the new National Security Law, does the Hong Kong legislature oblige priests to violate sacramental secrecy or not?
Hong Kong has its own regime, which is different from the rest of the Republic of China. On March 19, 2024, its lawmakers approved by unanimity the National Security Law, which introduced penalties such as life imprisonment for crimes related to treason, sedition and insurrection, and up to 20 years in prison for the theft of State secrets.
The United States, Great Britain and the European Union commented that the new Law can restrict liberties even more in Hong Kong. And they opine that the legislative process was accelerated. The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Turk, also described the “speedy” writing of the law and criticized it for being “ a regressive step in the protection of human rights.”
The approval of this National Security Law of Hong Gong, of more than 200 pages, happened in just one session, after a second and third reading in the Legislative Council, as the city’s Congress is called. It seems that its urgency seeks to “protect” Hong Kong from “outside interference” and avoid what happened in 2003, when open debate in the civil society ended in protests with hundreds of thousands of people, and obliged the government to withdraw a disposition that, in practice, impeded dissidence, according to the model in the rest of China.
Article 23 of the Basic Law establishes that Hong Gong has its own national security legislation, which was approved by 89 votes in favour and none against. Moreover, the judicial power was not convoked in the hearings of the Legislative Council as is usual.
A speedy approval of the Law was urgent. The Council’s 88 members intervened in the debate to support the Law. And Andrew Leung, President of the Assembly, added his vote although he does not usually vote.
John Lee, the city’s Director, said that the approval of the Law, which came into force on March 23, was “an historic moment for Hong Kong.”
The new Law punishes dozens of crimes in five categories: treason, insurrection, theft of State secrets, espionage and sabotage that endangers national security, as well as outside interference.
John Lee sees the Law as “an effective padlock to avoid thieves, although it seems, rather, that the Authorities want to avoid “threats posed by outside forces.”
David Cameron, Britain’s Foreign Affairs Minister, pointed out that the new Law “harms even more the rights and liberties that are enjoyed” in Hong Kong and will have “implications of great reach” for the State of Law and institutions’ independence.
Vedant Patel, spokesman of the U.S. State Department, said to journalists on March 19 that the United States was “alarmed by the broad dispositions and what we interpret as vaguely defined dispositions” in the Law.
Given that Chinese Catholics can commit crimes during protests or actions related to the Hong Kong Authority and confess them in the Sacrament of Penance, priests could be accused of crimes against the Law of sedition, if they don’t reveal knowledge of these actions, which the secrecy of the Sacrament impedes them from violating. Under the banner of “National Security,” henceforth the Hong Kong police will be able to carry out any intervention against a priest.
Lee’s reference, on March 19, was that the Law “will enable Hong Kong to prevent, suppress and punish effectively espionage activities, conspiracies and traps of foreign intelligence agencies, and the infiltration and sabotage carried out by hostile forces.” Is this opening the door to coerce or condemn Catholic priests who refuse to reveal deeds of the faithful made known in Confession?
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