HRIC cautions against loosening Sanctions Against Hong Kong Government According to Bloomberg, China's Ministry of Commerce recently stated that the United States would allow Executive Order 13936 concerning Hong Kong (the "President's Executive Order on Hong Kong Normalization") to lapse, describing this as an important step toward improving bilateral relations. The order had been set to expire on July 14. With the lapse of the "national emergency with respect to Hong Kong" declared under it, a number of Hong Kong officials who had been sanctioned solely on the basis of that emergency were removed from the U.S. sanctions list. Human Rights in China views this development with concern and regret. The decision followed U.S.-China trade negotiations and was promptly welcomed by Beijing, yet Washington has to date secured no substantive concessions on Hong Kong's human rights situation in return. At the same time, freedoms in Hong Kong continue to erode. This February, 78-year-old Jimmy Lai was sentenced to 20 years in prison, the heaviest penalty yet handed down under the Hong Kong National Security Law. Political prisoners including Benny Tai, Joshua Wong, Gwyneth Ho, Leung Kwok-hung, Chow Hang-tung, and Lee Cheuk-yan remain behind bars, and the reckoning under Article 23 and the National Security Law has never let up. To ease sanctions against this backdrop is tantamount to condoning Beijing's erosion of Hong Kong's autonomy and its systematic suppression of dissent. We urge the U.S. government to weigh its choices with care and not repeat the error of trading human rights for commercial and economic interests. Especially on the eve of Xi Jinping's anticipated September visit to Washington, Washington should hold firm in maintaining pressure on the officials responsible, rather than treating the freedom of Hong Kong people as a bargaining chip.