Hong Kong: The impact of China’s national security law

THE national security law adopted by China’s National People’s Congress Standing Committee in the morning of June 30 and promulgated in Hong Kong at 11 p.m. that night had an immediate effect, with localist groups disbanding that same day. Joshua Wong, Nathan Law and Agnes Chow, founders of Demosisto, the most prominent such group, announced their withdrawal from the party before the group announced its disbandment. Other groups followed suit. Law has fled abroad, his whereabouts unknown. The previous week, 80-year-old Anson Chan, former chief secretary both before and after the 1997 handover, announced that she was stepping back from public life following the death of her daughter. She had...