HK Businessman to Sue China in UK Court for Violating Sino-British Joint Declaration

Elmer Yuen in Washington on June 12, 2020. (Sean Lin/Sound of Hope)

Elmer Yuen, an entrepreneur and political commentator from Hong Kong, said he will sue the PRC (People’s Republic of China) in the UK’s supreme court, for violating the Sino-British Joint Declaration.

“[The Chinese Communist Party (CCP)] said it was a ”historical document,“ and tore up the Sino-British Joint Declaration by passing the national security law,” Yuen told The Epoch Times at an anti-CCP rally in front of the Chinese embassy in London.

“If you break a contract, that contract should be ... declared null and void,” Yuen told NTD.

He said sovereignty over Hong Kong—as a result of the Chinese communist regime’s violation of the Declaration—should be returned to the UK.

‘The British Government Is Still Asleep’

While praising the UK’s independent judicial system, Yuen was critical of the British government’s naiveté about the CCP.

“The British government is still asleep,” he said, “It still thinks the CCP is [running] a country. No! It is a criminal organization. The whole of China [is run by] a criminal organization.”

Yuen said working with the CCP is like dealing with the mafia.

“How could you think that the CCP will abide by the contract?” he said. “That’s impossible!”

About Beijing imposing the National Security Law on Hong Kong, he said it’s “a joke, the biggest joke,” that the UK “still believes in ‘One Country, Two Systems,’ the ‘Sino-British Joint Declaration,’ and the ‘Basic Law,’” Yuen said.

“Donald Trump understands that the situation now is not ‘one country, two systems’ but rather ’one country, one system,' which means that Hong Kong and Shanghai are the same.”

Yuen has repeatedly spoken of how China is not functioning as a country.

“The nation is a facade; the government is a facade. Every government official, even including the prime minister, has a party member behind him, which is Xi Jinping, pulling the strings,” he said during an webinar on July 20.

Speaking in the same webinar, Canadian human rights lawyer David Matas made the same observation.

“The relationship between the Chinese Communist Party and the Chinese state is unlike anything we see in democratic countries. State functionaries are puppets. It is the party which pulls the strings,” said Matas.

British Capital Held Hostage

When asked why he thought the British government hasn’t been tougher on the Chinese regime, Yuen said the UK government is afraid of losing its economic interests.

“High-speed rail, nuclear power plant, and [they were] also talking about a chip factory ... all economic interests. Everyone thinks it’s lucrative [doing business with China].”

Yuen, who has been doing business in China since the 1980s, said it isn’t really lucrative.

“A sham! Who made money? Not one country benefited from doing business with China,” he said. “You may think Germany made money. Germany is now stuck there and can’t get itself out.”

Yuen said it is because of businesses that the UK government feels its hands are tied.

“So now it dares not sanction [the CCP] because they have to think about its own interests. Jardine Matheson​ and Swire Group are both British companies, HSBC and Cathay Pacific, etc. What to do then? Now they are held hostage by the CCP.”

HSBC and Cathay Pacific have recently been under fire for “kneeling” under CCP pressure.

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has criticized HSBC, for siding with Beijing in its suppressing the freedom of Hong Kong citizens, maintaining the bank accounts of people who had been “sanctioned” for denying the freedom of Hong Kongers, and reportedly denying Hong Kong-based executives of the pro-democracy publisher Next Media access to their personal bank accounts and credit cards.

The obstruction of access to HSBC accounts was just one example of China’s bullying of America’s “friends in the United Kingdom,” Pompeo said.

Cathay Pacific Airways, another British company, has been denounced by protesters for bowing to Beijing pressure by dismissing crew for participating in or supporting demonstrations against the communist regime’s encroachment.

Chinese company Ping An Insurance last week rose its stake in HSBC, injecting more Chinese capital into the British lender.

When asked if the British government can still protect the British companies in Hong Kong, Yuen was not optimistic.

“Of course not,” he said. “What can you do when you are in bed with the mafia?”

Yuen has spent the last three months lobbying U.S. politicians to designate the CCP as a criminal organization, using the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act, a 1970 federal law in the United States that specifically targets organized crime, to bring charges against bosses and key players in each of the “families.”

He said he’s not going to lobby parliamentarians in the UK, because he doesn’t think he can manage “to wake them up.”

But he doesn’t think it will take long for the UK to change its attitude.

“When all the British companies in Hong Kong are held hostage and when the mainland starts buying HSBC, [the UK] will start to wake up. Seems like it is about to wake up—it won’t take long.”

The rally Yuen attended is one of several anti-CCP rallies held in the UK on Oct. 1, a day the CCP calls National Day of the PRC, and what many dissidents call the memorial day.

“That’s [the CCP’s] doomsday,” Yuen said.

Stacey Tong of The Epoch Times Hong Kong edition, Jane Werrell of NTD, and Epoch Times reporters Mary Clark, Jeremy Sandberg, and Bonnie Evans contributed to this report.