Hong Kong’s security chief has refused to disclose information about national security investigations following a lawmaker’s questions about whether the US Agency for International Development (USAID) had provided funding to organisations in the city.
Hong Kong’s homegrown security law, the Safeguarding National Security Ordinance, also known as Article 23, has regulations regarding local organisations’ acceptance of overseas funding that originates from a political body, Secretary for Security Chris Tang told lawmaker Junius Ho in a written reply on Wednesday.
Ho had asked whether the government had details about whether “local NGOs have accepted advantages from overseas organisations,” naming USAID, a US agency responsible for administering foreign humanitarian aid, as well as the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), a private non-profit funded by the US Congress.
He claimed that USAID “has been providing funding support for overseas [NGOs] on a long-term basis, and assisting such NGOs in carrying out work that endangers the national security” of their respective places.
However, Tang declined to give further details regarding such funding in Hong Kong, saying that the work on safeguarding national security “cannot be disclosed.”
In his reply, Tang also said that Article 23 had endowed authorities with the power to ban the operation of organisations deemed endangering national security, including those that receive funding from abroad.
USAID funding
USAID has effectively been shut down following US President Donald Trump’s return to power. On his first day back in the White House in January, Trump ordered a 90-day freeze of all US foreign aid.
Shortly afterwards, billionaire Elon Musk, a key adviser to Trump, and his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) gained access to USAID’s payment and computer systems and told most of its staff they were placed on leave.
Musk also attacked the NED on his platform, X, in early February. Later that month, the NED issued a statement saying it was unable to access its Congress-appropriated funds and had “been forced to suspend support for nearly 2,000 partners worldwide.”
According to the description on the US government’s website, USAID provides assistance to countries “recovering from disaster, trying to escape poverty, and engaging in democratic reforms.”
It is unclear whether any organisations in Hong Kong have received funding from USAID.
An HKFP search of publicly available US government spending records found no results for organisations based in, or operating in, Hong Kong funded by USAID over the past five years.
Separate from the 2020 Beijing-enacted security law, the homegrown Safeguarding National Security Ordinance targets treason, insurrection, sabotage, external interference, sedition, theft of state secrets and espionage. It allows for pre-charge detention of up to 16 days, and suspects’ access to lawyers may be restricted, with penalties involving up to life in prison. Article 23 was shelved in 2003 amid mass protests, remaining taboo for years. But, on March 23, 2024, it was enacted having been fast-tracked and unanimously approved at the city’s opposition-free legislature.
The law has been criticised by rights NGOs, Western states and the UN as vague, broad and “regressive.” Authorities, however, cited perceived foreign interference and a constitutional duty to “close loopholes” after the 2019 protests and unrest.
