Loyalists may dismiss it as an over-interpretation of a change of wordings. But the use of the word “inspection (視察)” by China’s official Xinhua news agency to describe the upcoming visit of NPC chairman Zhang Dejiang to Hong Kong cannot be taken lightly.
It is yet another worrying sign of the Beijing leadership magnifying the importance of the principle of “one country” while downgrading the special status of Hong Kong. It raises the question of whether the city will become “just another Chinese city” ultimately as pessimists and sceptics have warned.
Political observers and pundits have good reason to feel something weird when they read a Xinhua report about the visit of Zhang to the city between next Tuesday and Thursday.
The story’s headline says: Zhang will attend the “One Belt, One Road” top-level forum and “inspect” the Hong Kong SAR. Previous reports carried by the official media normally used “visit” or “fact-finding” visit to describe those trips. They include the visits by President Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang to the city in 2008 and 2011 respectively.
Full article:
http://www.vohk.hk/2016/05/12/word-play-in-beijings-hong-kong-game-worrying/
