HONG KONG — A prominent arts and cultural institution in Hong Kong this week canceled an appearance by a writer critical of the Beijing government, aggravating a sense in this semiautonomous city that the political freedoms it once enjoyed are giving way at an accelerating pace.
British-Chinese writer Ma Jian, who lives in exile in London, was due to host a panel on Saturday afternoon and separately discuss “China Dream,” a new novel critical of Chinese totalitarianism and President Xi Jinping’s vision for national greatness. The events were relocated from the Tai Kwun Center for Heritage and Arts out of political considerations, the center abruptly announced this week.
Tai Kwun’s decision came a week after a dissident cartoonist canceled a solo exhibition in Hong Kong following what he said were threats from mainland authorities. And it came on the same day that Hong Kong immigration officials denied entry to Financial Times journalist Victor Mallet, whom it had expelled in an unprecedented move one month prior.
Late Friday, a backup venue that had been arranged for Ma’s events told The Washington Post that it would also decline to host the writer, jeopardizing his Hong Kong appearances.
Taken together, the incidents have reinforced concerns by pro-democracy activists, human rights observers and Western diplomats that Hong Kong’s status as a free-speech haven is swiftly eroding, either under direct pressure from Beijing or from the subtler effects of self-censorship.
In a statement that did not mention Ma by name, Tai Kwun’s director, Timothy Calnin, said the center wanted to relocate the literary event because “we do not want Tai Kwun to become a platform to promote the political interests of any individual.”
The Annex, a backup location that organizers planned to use to host Ma, similarly backed out. Management said in an email Friday that it has “no affiliation with the event nor the author.”
Speaking by telephone before departing London, Ma, 65, said he was puzzled by the last-minute reversal, given that the festival’s agenda — and the rooms he was scheduled to speak in — had long been decided.
Ma said he was determined to fly to Hong Kong to find out if he could enter the territory at all and, if so, demand an explanation.
“I want to know if this was an instance of self-censorship, or if there were greater political forces at play,” he said. “I need to know the truth.”
[Believe in the motherland, China tells Hong Kong — and respect its might]
Hong Kong was guaranteed a degree of political autonomy and freedom as part of a 1997 handover agreement between China and Britain that ended British colonial rule in the territory. But Chinese authorities, deeply alarmed by the eruption of sprawling pro-democracy protests in 2014 known as the Umbrella Movement, have tried to instill a sense of patriotism and tightened political controls in ways large and small.
Hong Kong leaders, who answer ultimately to Beijing, have taken steps to block opposition candidates from assuming office in recent years, banned a pro-independence political party outright this summer and taken a markedly tougher line against separatist advocacy. This month, prosecutors are set to try nine leaders of the 2014 protests on “public nuisance” charges.
Media organizations, business groups and Western governments were taken aback in October when Hong Kong expelled Mallet of the Financial Times, who had hosted a talk at the Foreign Correspondents Club with pro-independence activist Andy Chan despite demands by Hong Kong and Beijing officials to call off the event.
Mallet left Hong Kong last month but was questioned by immigration officials for hours on Thursday when he sought to reenter as a tourist. He was eventually denied entry, the FT reported.
In an emailed statement, a British consulate-general spokesman said the Foreign Office was “very concerned by the authorities’ unprecedented rejection of a visa for a senior British journalist, which undermines Hong Kong’s freedom of speech and freedom of the press.”
Mark Field, Britain’s minister of state for Asia, was in Hong Kong this week and would raise Mallet’s case with local authorities “as a matter of urgency,” the statement added.
Political observers in Hong Kong say that although the government never acknowledged that Mallet’s ejection was retribution for hosting the talk with Chan — whom a former Hong Kong leader equated with a criminal — it sent a clear message to all businesses and institutions to step back from controversial activities.
“This is exactly how censorship and self-censorship foster each other,” said Maya Wong, China researcher for Human Rights Watch. “Everyone collectively moves back, far behind the red line, out of a sense of self-preservation.”
After several Hong Kong booksellers were widely believed to have been abducted by Chinese security agents in 2016, the city’s freewheeling political publishing industry similarly withered, as stores voluntarily folded and writers shied away from digging into Chinese politics.
Ma, the British novelist, said on Twitter last week that he has not been able to find a Hong Kong publisher for “China Dream” because they were “too afraid.” Several publishers, he told Hong Kong media, insisted that he rename a character he had called “Xi Jinping.”
Penguin, his British publisher, has been bolder, describing Ma’s new novel on its website as “an arrow at President Xi Jinping’s ‘China Dream’ propaganda” and “a biting satire of totalitarianism.”
Ma, who published a book early in his career about Tibet — another third rail of Chinese politics — remains persona non grata in the country of his birth and has not been back in decades. He was denied entry when he last attempted to cross the southern border from Hong Kong in 2011.
He lived for years in Hong Kong, where he holds permanent residency. He moved to Britain in 1997 when the territory was handed back to China.
“After 1997, I thought Hong Kong would have at least another 50 years of freedom,” he said. “I did not expect intellectual censorship to grow step-by-step this bad, this fast.”
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