Matthew Bradford

For me this is still one of THE images from the 2019 Hong Kong protests; a warning to the world.

@HenryMorgan_X This 👆

我最讨厌的就是那些外国人，来中国“旅游”几天，就觉得自己看懂了中国。点个外卖、刷刷拼多多、吃几顿饭、拍几张高楼大厦的照片，再被路人友好地拉去合个影，就敢大言不惭地说：“这就是真实的中国。” 你们根本没见过中国老百姓凌晨五点挤地铁赶去996工厂的样子，没见过35岁被优化后在招聘群里像狗一样投简历却石沉大海的绝望，没见过父母砸锅卖铁供孩子上培训班却换来一个“内卷”结果的眼泪，更没见过老人重病时一家人跪在医院走廊里为几十万手术费四处借钱、最终放弃治疗的崩溃。 你们不知道我们买房要掏空六个钱包、背三十年房贷，成了房奴还得感恩戴德；你们不知道小区物业勾结黑势力，业主想换个物业都能被威胁、被殴打、被起诉，最后只能忍气吞声；你们更不知道，当普通人遇到不公、想维权的时候，面对的是层层阻挠、被约谈、被喝茶、甚至被“寻衅滋事”。 你们只看到灯红酒绿的表象，只享受了低人权优势下的廉价服务、廉价劳动力、廉价消费，就敢站在道德制高点对中国指手画脚。 我恶心透了你们这种浅薄的“中国通”，然后发到 youtube为了博取流量！ 真正的中国，不是你们镜头里那几栋会发光的玻璃幕墙，而是千千万万底层老百姓被压得喘不过气的血汗、被榨干的青春、被无视的尊严，以及一套在关键时刻永远不站在弱者一边的“法制”。 想评价中国？先把眼睛睁开，看看那些你们永远不会去住的小区、永远不会去排队的医院、永远不会去上的工厂流水线，去看看多少房奴依然还着贷款却无法居住的烂尾楼！

@narendramodi Twat

Deeply concerned by reports of the targeting of the residence of the President of the Russian Federation. Ongoing diplomatic efforts offer the most viable path toward ending hostilities and achieving peace. We urge all concerned to remain focused on these efforts and to avoid any actions that could undermine them. @KremlinRussia_E

@haileyhmt Sorry to hear that you were invited for tea, Hailey. Gar Yau! 💪🏼

In response to the Hong Kong SAR Government’s call, I hereby state clearly that I will not have any association with any foreign forces or individuals alleged to be undermining social stability, and I have fully ceased any contact that could be misconstrued. My position has always been clear: all my actions are guided strictly by the principle of abiding by the law.

Here’s petition initiator Miles Kwan, who was detained by police, when he was brought back to his home by officers to gather evidence @inmediahk

@suupermario_hl DLLM 😊

@chungchingkwong Cockroaches coming out again using the tragic loss of lives to drive their agenda. You should be ashamed of yourself

【Tai Po Fire, Bid-Rigging, and Bamboo Scaffolding in NSL-Era Hong Kong】 The Tai Po fire was not just a tragic accident; it was the predictable outcome of a broken system. A system where estate management, renovation contracts, and public safety have long been undermined by collusion, bid-rigging, and zero accountability. And since the NSL, Hong Kong has no civil society or independent media strong enough to hold these networks to account. Even when residents and expert and activists like Jason Poon, took their own samples of the netting and tried to expose the risks, they were ignored. Wang Fuk Court was in the middle of a HK$330M “mega-repair.” Residents had protested the sky-high cost, accusing the owners’ corporation of force-pushing the plan through despite objections. Transparency was minimal. Oversight was weak. This is exactly how bid-rigging works in HK housing estates: pre-selected contractors, inflated prices, limited competition, opaque decisions, and incentives to cut corners on materials and safety, because no one is genuinely checking, nor can the civil society did what it used to do-- to hold different people to account and raise awareness of these issues. During the renovation, the contractor wrapped the buildings with mesh, and foam boards that allegedly failed to meet fire-resistant standards. Some residents took a sample of the netting material to test on their own; videos showed it burned and dripped-- hardly in compliance with the regulations [1]. Here, cheaper, flammable materials meant higher profit margins and higher risk. The Wang Fuk Court contractor ignored safety again and again, with a long trail of corruption and violations. In 9 years, they racked up at least 17 regulatory breaches and fines. When the fire started, the netting as shown in many videos, burned quickly. A slow fire became an inferno in minutes. Police arrested multiple directors and engineers from the construction company. ICAC launched an investigation into the renovation contract itself — including how a controversial HK$330M plan was approved and whether corruption was involved. This is the cost of collusion: Bid-rigging doesn’t just overcharge residents. It kills oversight, kills competition, and, in this case, helped create conditions that killed people. Hong Kong’s building maintenance system has tolerated collusion and corruption for years. The Tai Po fire is the clearest possible warning: corruption in estate management is not just a financial issue. It tells us a lot about HK-China relationship. Beijing could and had rewritten Hong Kong’s political system overnight and crushed organised dissent, but it has never been able to cleanly uproot the entrenched construction and maintenance networks that profit from this model of “business as usual.” And this is where the politics of bamboo scaffolding enters the picture. There is a long-understood agenda from Beijing to undermine Hong Kong’s bamboo scaffolding industry, not because it is unsafe, but precisely because it is a local craft, part of the Hong Kong identity, practised safely for decades, and one of the last corners of construction work where Chinese state-owned developers and their preferred contractors have never managed to gain a foothold. Bamboo scaffolding is not standard in the PRC; metal scaffolding is. And right now, mainland China faces a record glut of metal scaffolding materials, made worse by recent scandals over fake steel being used in their production , scandals that have no counterpart in Hong Kong’s bamboo trade. So when the Hong Kong Government suddenly pushes a mandatory shift to metal scaffolding “for safety,” it is hard to ignore the timing. Yahoo Finance reports that Hong Kong experts defending the safety of bamboo scaffolding are being aggressively dismissed by PRC netizens, while the Government doubles down on the same narrative. In other words, this is not really about fire safety. It is a political and economic project to replace a resilient local craft with PRC-standard practices, conveniently absorbing a mainland oversupply while sidelining an industry Beijing has never been able to capture. Thus, the tragedy is being used to accelerate “integration,” dressed up as technical modernisation. On paper, it’s about protecting the public; in practice, it sidesteps politically connected local players without ever reckoning with the actual causes of the fire: opaque estate governance, weak enforcement, collusion, and the hollowing out of watchdogs under the NSL. We, Hongkongers, outside or inside the city do not trust the government or any of its proxies. Five years of national security crackdowns, media censorship, and relentless state messaging have not repaired the rupture exposed in 2019. That distrust is alive, deep, and justified. HKSAR Gov and co are clearly not acting in good faith. Now, as you are reading, volunteers who organised themselves to help were reported to the police for unlawful assembly, a move that looks less like public order and more like spite. It is yet another sign that the Government now treats ordinary civic-minded Hongkongers as adversaries. And I fear reporting them is not the end of it, as Hongkongers came up with 4 very reasonable demands asking for investigation and accountability. For us, the fact that John Lee decided to thank Xi Jinping first, rather than giving the credit to the brave firefighters, showed us that they are replicating the Mainland disaster-stagecraft: PR-first, people-last; party-state-first, people-last. Taken together, the political economy of scaffolding, the erasure of civil oversight, and the Government’s behaviour during the crisis reinforce the same truth: the problem is not bamboo. The problem is a system where power, profit, and propaganda take precedence over safety, accountability, and the lives of Hong Kong people. [1] facebook.com/JasonPoonHongK…

@trussliz 🥬

I'm glad the US President and the rest of the world are seeing the BBC for what it is. Its failure to tell the truth on everything from transgender ideology to economics to Gaza has done huge damage to politics and government in this country. This should be the end of nationalised broadcasting.

I see little Tommy’s been out overnight putting up flags again

@TRobinsonNewEra With any luck you’re going down.

Final day in court. Is it prison? Or is it freedom?

The entrance to Wideford Hill Chambered Cairn, with its three concentric stone walls. Dating from around 3500-2400 BC, the ‘Maeshowe-type’ cairn is built into the side of Wideford Hill, near Kirkwall in Orkney. 📸 My own #TombTuesday #Prehistory #Orkney

Is Regina in or out? Rumours abound that the legislators including Regina Ip have been given whispered instructions to pull out from the so-called "Legislative Council General Election". In response, the leader of the New People's Party today said her party would make an announcement at "an appropriate time". But around seven or eight incumbent lawmakers have already announced their surprise retirement, including Tommy Cheung, Chan Kin-por, Doreen Kong (who hasn't officially announced but dropped enough hints for it to be a safe bet) and house chairman Andrew Leung, with more expected to announce this week. The retirements highlight the issue with these "elections": only rubber-stamped individuals can even think about standing as a candidate. When someone like Regina Ip is rumoured for the chop, we know something serious is going on: and for those chopped, going against the "whispered instructions over tea" would be futile. As I personally found in the relatively humble DC elections, you need a complex set of approvals to become a candidate for even a small local election, and LegCo's system is designed as an impenetrable firewall. You need at least 10 nominations, maximum 20, from the Election Committee. Someone like Regina could achieve 10 signatures in her beauty sleep if that was the only requirement. But you need nominations split across all five Election Committee sectors. The first three sectors are where an average Joe or Jane with political ambitions could feasibly find support - the professionals, industrials, grassroots & religious groups. No problem there except for numbers - nominations are limited to one per EC member, already limiting the pool to ~150 candidates for the 50 geographic and functional seats (if I've read the rather clumsy rules correctly). The fourth sector is trickier: LegCo members themselves and "representatives of district organisations and other organisations" which means extreme patriots appointed by govt and who will be entirely loyal to the govt's demands. While LegCo members might be more free to choose their favourite candidate, there's not enough of them to make these elections truly "open" in that sense. But that's all irrelevant, because the "Final Boss" is the fifth Election Committee sector: "HK's deputies to the National People’s Congress, members of the NCCPPCC and representatives of Hong Kong members of relevant national organisations." Those are the heavyweights appointed directly by Beijing. And it means nobody not rubber-stamped by Beijing is getting past that fifth sector. Which is why even popular and long-standing lawmakers such as Regina will perhaps be announcing their retirements to accommodate Beijing's desire for a younger cohort to lead HK into 2047. Maybe it's an age thing and the entire LegCo will be 50 or under; I might be wrong about that, but it's the obvious direction. I do believe this LegCo cohort will be for keeps and only death or severe disgrace will alter the membership between now and 2047. Well, I guess we will see on 24 Oct, when the first hopefuls submit their nominations.

The trial of Hong Kong democracy activist Anna Kwok’s father began today. He’s accused of “handling assets of an absconder”—a charge transparently designed to punish Anna, who lives abroad and has a bounty on her head from Hong Kong’s National Security Police for her advocacy work. The prosecution's agreed facts in court make clear how hollow the case is. In 1999, Anna’s father bought her a small life insurance policy—worth just US$11,000 when it expired in 2020. The prosecution’s own witness, the insurance agent that Mr. Kwok continued paying for the policy himself and that Anna never signed or paid anything. No allegation has been made that Mr. Kwok intended to provide these funds to Anna, or that he has ever financially supported Anna after her arrest warrant. The insurance agent, who was just doing his job, was interrogated for 14 hours by the National Security Department and threatened with prosecution if he didn't testify. This is what “rule of law” looks like in Hong Kong today: a father dragged into court for buying life insurance for his daughter 25 years ago, all to intimidate a democracy activist across the world into silence. Western companies still operating in Hong Kong should also take note of what was done to this insurance agent: by operating in a city run by thugs, you are putting your employees in danger of interrogation and threats of arrest for simply doing their jobs. Chinese report: tinyurl.com/3yp39e5c

Redditor spots this, installed last month: reddit.com/r/HongKong/com… (HK was a British colony at the time, though local school kids are taught something different: hongkongfp.com/2022/08/04/hon…)

It's Golden Week, so let's check out the 3 a.m. scene at the most affordable accommodation available for mainland tourists in Hong Kong: the 24-hour McDonald's. (Photos: HK01, also see ALT text for captions)

Four years ago this week China’s government released me from 1,019 days of wrongful detention as a political hostage. If not for heroic advocacy and diplomacy, I might still be in a cell there, with the crisis unresolved. I'm eternally grateful for my liberty. Beijing still hasn’t returned all of my personal property, but at least its senior officials are talking to their Canadian counterparts again. On Sep. 23 on the sidelines of the UN General Debate, Canada’s Prime Minister Mark Carney and China’s Premier Li Qiang led the first substantive in-person discussions the two countries have had at their level since 2017. The dialogue, which included Commerce Minister Wang Wentao, focused on economic issues, and reportedly was relatively frank and constructive. Speaking to the press, Carney emphasized opportunities to sell China more energy and commodities. He also alluded to the main trade sticking point: Canada’s defensive tariffs to stop the dumping of EVs, steel and aluminum from China, and Beijing’s retaliatory tariffs on canola and more. No breakthroughs. While it’s good that Canada and China are talking again, we should have modest expectations for what can be achieved. Even with both sides under pressure from Trump’s tariffs to find new market opportunities, prospects for cooperation are limited by the Party-state’s hostile behaviour. Front of mind should be Beijing’s decisive support for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which is not only enabling Putin to kill thousands and menace NATO countries, but also costing Canadian taxpayers over a billion dollars. That fits with the CCP’s strategy to distract and weaken Western democracies while it works to dominate East Asia, displace the U.S. and reshape the global order in line with its own authoritarian imperatives—all while keeping Western elites complacent about continuing to do business with China. Canadian negotiators should keep in mind that their CCP counterparts will link issues, are ruthlessly transactional, and won’t feel bound to honour any agreements they sign. Their ethical framework is simply that whatever’s good for the Party is correct. So agreements will work just as long as the Party thinks it benefits, but they won't stop it from continuing foreign interference, transnational repression, violating human rights, or coercion, when they serve its purposes. CTV News “Power Play” host Vassy Kapelos was kind enough to invite me on to comment on the Carney-Li meeting and some of the above topics. It was short notice and I spoke off the cuff, focusing on the challenges of negotiating with China. Good to have a news anchor talking with me rather than about me, at least! Link to the video segment in the comments 👇 , followed by a link👇 to an article I wrote that goes into more depth on Canada-China relations. More on my Substack. #CanadaChina #CarneyLi #MarkCarney #LiQiang #negotiation #TradeWar #ArbitraryDetention

@jaytaryela Couldn’t have happened to a nicer bunch of guys.

Here is a longer video capturing the collision between the PLA Navy 164 and the China Coast Guard 3104. The Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) has consistently urged the Chinese government to respect the COLREGS and to approach these matters with professionalism, especially considering their role in enforcing maritime laws. We have also emphasized that such reckless behavior at sea could ultimately lead to accidents. Our thoughts are with the CCG personnel who may have been injured in this incident. 🙏🏻

What does Beijing think about Putin meeting Trump in Alaska and about seeking a resolution to the Russian invasion of Ukraine? 📍Putin called Xi Jinping before accepting Donald Trump's invitation to meet in Alaska 📍 “China is pleased to see Russia and the United States maintaining contact and improving ties to advance a political resolution of the Ukraine crisis”, Xi Jinping was reported to have said to Putin 📍”Beijing will maintain its stance on the need for peace talks and a diplomatic solution to the conflict”, Chinese state broadcaster CCTV quoted Xi 📍China does not want Russia to lose the war, so the meeting in Alaska and a potential outcome of Ukraine being forced to territorial concessions meet perfectly China’s geopolitical ambitions ➡️ China’s proposal for the European security architecture aligns with Russian security spheres. 📍⬆️ This outcome would also help China establish a foothold in Ukraine and potentially offer itself as a party for the reconstruction of regions claimed by Russia and even as a party for peacekeeping 📍It would be a joint victory for both Russia and China against the US and NATO, and thus demonstrate that the axis of autocrats can achieve results by supporting each other 📍This outcome would offer relief for China from any sanctions that the partnership with Russia could otherwise trigger. It needs cheap oil, natural gas and other commodities from Russia to maintain its economic growth 📍After meeting with Trump, Putin will travel to China and will participate in the SCO meeting 📍The Sino-Russia relationship is the most important quasi-alliance for both, and the outcome in Ukraine will show us how far they have come in establishing the new [autocrat-friendly] global order. In addition to Ukraine’s sovereignty, this is what is at stake here.

@webbhk @UKinHongKong Congratulations, well deserved!

Many thanks to @UKinHongKong for their generous hospitality this afternoon when I received the Insignia of a Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire.

For a whole year I shared a riverbank with a male mute swan Everyday on my walk we conversed without a word being said Every day I hoped he found the partner he craved This year he brought his new family to see me

The Odishika Remix of Chains & Whips. Enjoy 🎧 youtu.be/fnI7eHfSnOk?si…