Security Tight As NPCSC Begins Three-day Meeting

There's tight security outside the Great Hall of the People in Beijing as the National People's Congress Standing Committee starts its three-day meeting, possibly to discuss Beijing's national security law for Hong Kong.

Hong Kong has one member on the standing committee, Tam Yiu-chung, although a dozen Hong Kong delegates have been invited to observe the meeting. Under the rules, the delegates will only be present at the meeting when the agenda includes Hong Kong affairs.

Earlier, state media reported some of the items on the agenda, such as a draft law on export control, but no mention was made of the security law. Nevertheless, the standing committee is widely expected to approve the security legislation for Hong Kong on Tuesday.

Many had expected full details of the draft law to be released when the previous NPC Standing Committee meeting ended on June 20, but its contents were only outlined in a Xinhua report.

Tam declined to reveal whether the national security law was on the meeting's agenda. He told RTHK that he would talk after the end of the three-day meeting. Earlier, an NPC deputy Ip Kwok-him said he expected a vote on the law during the meeting and that the full details of the law would be published before the vote.

But another observer of the meeting, the Hong Kong Federation of Trade Unions' Stanley Ng, posted a picture of the agenda on his Facebook social media account.

It showed part of an inside page of a booklet, which said "agenda of the June 28-30 standing committee meeting." It showed an item which began at 9 am but the full content was covered by Ng's guest pass. From what could be read, the item appeared to be related to Hong Kong.

He later posted a picture of a copy of the Basic Law, saying "supplementary document for vetting" without specifying any further details.

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