'Beijing May Come After Americans In Hong Kong Next'

The head of the Hong Kong Journalists Association (HKJA) warned on Thursday that American companies and foreign nationals in the city could become the next "victims" of Beijing's ongoing disputes with Washington, and the SAR government has been stripped of its power to handle immigration matters.

HJKA chairman Chris Yeung was commenting on Beijing's announcement this week that staff from the New York Times, Washington Post and Wall Street Journal were not only being thrown out of the mainland, but banned from working in Hong Kong or Macau.

The Foreign Ministry in Beijing later said the issue was a "diplomatic matter" and is therefore something for the central government to deal with.

But Yeung said the move had not only damaged the One Country, Two Systems principle and rendered "hollow" any claim that Hong Kong still enjoys media freedom, but also signalled that foreigners in the SAR are at risk.

"The Chinese government can arbitrarily define some private matters, business matters, non-political matters or non-diplomatic matters as 'foreign affairs' that fall within their jurisdiction," Yeung said.

"If the political row further worsens and the Chinese government intensifies their retaliation against any companies related to the United States, I think those companies or foreign nationals working in Hong Kong will become the victim. And that's the last thing I think the people who invented and engineered One Country, Two Systems would want to see."

He also rejected the idea that the expulsions were simply a retaliatory move that should have been expected after Washington cut the number of Chinese nationals allowed to work for mainland state-run media on American soil.

"Let's compare facts, whether those media organisations directly under the Chinese government are equivalent to The New York Times, to The Washington Post, which are privately run enterprises. It's not apples to apples," he told RTHK's Damon Pang.

"Of course, both governments have the power to dictate their own rules. But in this case, the Chinese government dictated the rules on Hong Kong, breaching the One Country, Two Systems promises. Our system is no longer applicable," Yeung said.