Until a few days ago, the peaceful turned occasionally violent pro-democracy movement by Hong Kong's inhabitants was about securing universal adult suffrage (UAS), official withdrawal of the extradition Bill, and resignation of HK's Chief Executive Officer Carrie Lam. However, when protestors failed to secure a resolution, some of them started waiving foreign nations' flags and singing national anthem, such as of US and UK.

There are conflicting views on the meaning of waving these flags and singing the anthems. They range from secessionist views (complete independence) or rule under a democratic bastion such as UK; diplomatic and political intervention by western democracies for securing HK's autonomy and UAS; while others not supporting a call to an another nation at all. Inkstone has covered these views here.

China has termed the expression of flag waving as foreign intervention in internal affairs with serious repercussion for HK. As I understand, whatever the numeric strength of these flag waivers be and so does their intention for that expression, waiving of a foreign flag and singing anthem and explicitly using signs such as "Liberate Hong Kong" in a political movement is tantamount to professing disloyalty to the State legally in possession of the territory under conflict.

In such a scenario, a state has obligation to protect itself from disloyal citizenry and to quell any movement threatening its territorial integrity. China is known to quell political movements threatening the status quo, the popular of them is the Tiananmen square protests and the massacre that followed, where China dubbed protestors as terrorists and prosecuted them violently.

What bewilders me is why China, being an authoritative State as it has always been, has not destroyed the movement through military intervention in the face of such disturbing acts of disloyalty to it by some protestors?

Chinese media many a times has dubbed these protestors in wholesale as nothing short of terrorists which is rather extreme but indeed fitting from Chinese point of view. So I don't assume China is showing restraint because it believes the majority of protestors do not want complete secession. In fact, authoritative states tend to find one reasonable excuse just to put their boots on the ground.

Until a few days ago, the peaceful turned occasionally violent pro-democracy movement by Hong Kong's inhabitants was about securing universal adult suffrage (UAS), official withdrawal of the extradition Bill, and resignation of HK's Chief Executive Officer Carrie Lam. However, when protestors failed to secure a resolution, some of them started waiving foreign nations' flags and singing national anthem, such as of US and UK.

There are conflicting views on the meaning of waving these flags and singing the anthems. They range from secessionist views (complete independence) or rule under a democratic bastion such as UK; diplomatic and political intervention by western democracies for securing HK's autonomy and UAS; while others not supporting a call to an another nation at all. Inkstone has covered these views here.

China has termed the expression of flag waving as foreign intervention in internal affairs with serious repercussion for HK. As I understand, whatever the numeric strength of these flag waivers be and so does their intention for that expression, waiving of a foreign flag and singing anthem and explicitly using signs such as "Liberate Hong Kong" in a political movement is tantamount to professing disloyalty to the State legally in possession of the territory under conflict.

In such a scenario, a state has obligation to protect itself from disloyal citizenry and to quell any movement threatening its territorial integrity. China is known to quell political movements threatening the status quo, the popular of them is the Tiananmen square protests and the massacre that followed, where China dubbed protestors as terrorists and prosecuted them violently.

What bewilders me is why China, being an authoritative State as it has always been, has not destroyed the movement through military intervention in the face of such disturbing acts of disloyalty to it by some protestors?

Chinese media many a times has dubbed these protestors in wholesale as nothing short of terrorists which is rather extreme but indeed fitting from Chinese point of view. So I don't assume China is showing restraint because it believes the majority of protestors do not want complete secession. In fact, authoritative states tend to find one reasonable excuse just to put their boots on the ground.

In addition, the Security Council, the global peacekeeping arm of UN, cannot be a problem for China with the latter being itself a permanent veto-equipped member. Furthermore, with Russia not having good democratic credentials and with UK marred with Brexit issues and a threat to recession with no-Brexit deal it is unlikely a resolution against China could even muster majority in UNSC.

I pondered and searched for some reasons why China is going to extreme lengths in showing restraints in direct intervention:

• Chinese economy has slowed down in the last few years and is reeling under pressure from trade war with the US, and HK is used as the launching platform for many Chinese enterprises to commerce and trade with the world, so quelling could further affect Chinese economy
• Chinese galactic size investment in the Belt and Road Initiative spanning Asia and Europe (et al to boost its economy and get rid of strategically dangerous and humongous dollar denominated foreign exchange reserves) stands threatened by potential European sanctions against it with the mishandling of HK
• the rise of China as a global power would take a big hit if its enterprises are hindered from expanding beyond its frontiers, not to mention the potential military pressure from NATO, but this seems far-fetched anyway.

I also found that HK makes about 3-4% of GDP, which though significant in absolute size may be something an anti-democratic state could be willing to sacrifice to prevent the infection of democracy from infecting the mainland. I further don't think UN could be a problem for China with the latter being itself a permanent veto-equipped member. Furthermore, with Russia not having good democratic credentials and with UK marred with Brexit issues and a sinking economy it is unlikely a resolution against China could even muster majority in UNSC.

Is the conciliatory approach through restraint and dialogue using HK government just a facade put up by China to project itself as a responsible power and to occupy space being created by the superpower US (lately alleged for being irresponsible on may international fronts)?

Could it be that China wants to first discredit the HK movement, which it seems to be doing in both mainland and outside by spreading misinformation on social media, so that when a reasonable consensus has been built against HK or at least in favor of China, HK movement could be destroyed without inviting public outcry from the global citizenry? This seems important because a public outcry at large from western democratic nations could force the latter to take a hard political stance against China for gross human rights violation.

So, what is actually preventing China from dismantling the pro-democracy movement in HK?