World War II and the Ingredients of Slaughter

2019/09/03 Leave a comment

Some uncomfortable parallels:

World War II began 80 years ago this Sunday after Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union signed a “nonaggression” pact that was, in fact, a mutual aggression pact. Adolf Hitler invaded Poland on Sept. 1, 1939. Russia’s invasion of Poland, no less murderous, followed two weeks later.

On Nov. 3 of that year, Joseph Goebbels, the propaganda minister, gave Hitler a report of his trip to Poland. “Above all, my description of the Jewish problem gets [Hitler’s] full approval,” he wrote in his diary. “The Jew is a waste product. It is a clinical issue more than a social one.”

For several years many commentators, including me, have written about the parallels between the prewar era and the present.

There’s the rise of dictatorial regimes intent on avenging past geopolitical humiliations and redrawing borders: Germany, Italy, Japan and Russia then; China, Iran and Russia now.

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Citizenship list in Indian state leaves out almost 2 million

2019/09/03 Leave a comment

Increased sectarianism, weaponized:

On Saturday morning, Farid Ali, a farmer dressed in his best sky-blue kurta and a white prayer cap, walked quietly into his village headquarters and received devastating news.

His name wasn’t on the list.

He looked, he waited, his legs began to shake, his dry lips began to move and he prayed there had been a mistake. But his name wasn’t anywhere.

Mr. Ali’s citizenship in India, where he has lived all his life, was now in question, and he could soon be separated from his family and hauled off to a prison camp.

He is one of nearly two million people in northeast India who were told Saturday that they could soon be declared stateless in a mass citizenship check that critics say is anti-Muslim. The news arrived in small, sunlit offices across the state of Assam, where citizenship lists were posted that drew huge crowds. Many walked away shocked and demoralized; others were joyous.

Source: Citizenship list in Indian state leaves out almost 2 million

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The “Debt” Immigrants Can Never Repay

2019/08/31 Leave a comment

Interesting read:

In July, Donald Trump told a story about how he coerced a wealthy businessman he didn’t like and who didn’t like him into praising him. The story focused on the pleasure Trump took in watching that man grovel and tell him he was “doing good.” In Trump’s hands, it was a parable about debt and gratitude. “You know,” Trump says he told this nameless enemy, “you don’t like me and I don’t like you. I never have liked you and you never have liked me—but you’re gonna support me because you’re a rich guy. And if you don’t support me, you’re going to be so goddamn poor you’re not going to believe it.” Trump describes the man as acquiescing and praising him, closing the story with: “And maybe we didn’t get along, but it’s not like he has a choice. He has no choice.”

To Trump, this is the story of an excellent “deal.” The best deal is one where the other party, who has something you want (like “a wealthy businessman’s grudging approval”), has no choice but to give it to you. It doesn’t matter if the praise is genuine as long as it costs the businessman something to give it. This calculus may seem pragmatic, but it ends up having a long-term price of its own: “You lose all your friends when you’re president,” Trump laments later in his monologue, one of his part-joke, part-confession asides. When the “deal” is your only framework, your universe shrinks and shuts out bonds over things like (for example) shared principles. It also makes nontransactional feedback—or any truly independent judgment untainted by bribes or threats—implausible. Some consequences of this approach are as old as they are obvious: Choosing to exert control through coercion, insincere praise, or veiled threats frays relations into the kind of exploitation on the one side and lying obsequiousness on the other that Shakespeare’s fools spent every play mocking. More worrying, for a democracy, is that there is no aspiration to anything resembling the ideal of equality here: Trump’s “deal” is about supremacy. He applies it to everything, and his most ardent support (and much of his administration) draws power by championing this worldview.

Trump’s story may have been apocryphal, but it’s also clarifying. Though no friend to the poor and marginalized, his priorities remain clear even with his ostensible equals; these priorities consist largely of making his deal partners lose. The story also offers one of the better examples of the gratitude tax he tries to exact from those with whom he interacts. This is a particular kind of American paternalism at its finest, a framework where the weaker party is not only forced into social or financial debt—they are humiliated and made to feel it. The paternalist values getting the better end of a deal over pretty much everything else. And that’s what a particular subset of Trump supporters—striving to “win” this way themselves—like about him.

Absent an arrangement where he profits financially, the paternalist deal-maker makes sure to profit socially. That’s crucial to understanding some of the less-obvious gears powering Trump’s worldview. Yes, he’s racist; yes, he’s classist. But he’ll make exceptions for poor people (or people from marginalized communities) if they’ll grovel and praise. Sen. Lindsey Graham argued that Trump’s dislike of Somali immigrants like Rep. Ilhan Omar is not based on race. The reason he’s demonizing her to his followers, Graham argued—as if this weren’t racist and above all slimy—was that she didn’t likehim. “I really do believe that if you’re a Somali refugee who likes Trump, he’s not going to say, ‘Go back to Somalia.’ ” You’ll recognize the currency Graham’s identifying here: The only nonwhite migrants worth tolerating, to this way of thinking, are those willing to pay—and they’d better give more than they got, whether in dollars or in gratitude.

This bleak standard is symptomatic of a larger pattern of American paternalism that has always existed but is now flourishing under Trump as other national ideals wither. The American paternalist in the Trumpian mold thinks he’s generous and even-keeled. In practice, he tends to be paranoid, erratic, and consumed by the pursuit of “deals” that put him ahead of the other party in an imaginary ledger he curates with obsessive care. People with less material wealth than him are suspect; as he cannot imagine other motives for them, they must be out to take advantage. He is therefore on guard with them and keen to maintain his advantage by any means. This has obvious consequences for immigration policy: Such a person sees nothing meritorious in courageous dreamers filled with human potential traveling to a foreign country to make a better life. In his ledger, their arrival (and indeed, their existence) appears as a debit.

Source: The “Debt” Immigrants Can Never Repay

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With hajj under threat, it’s time Muslims joined the climate movement

2019/08/31 Leave a comment

Given the dependence of Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries on oil and oil revenues, strikes me as secondary issue in relation to climate change. However, it might provide an entry point for discussions:

According to research published last week by US scientists, hajj is set to become a danger zone. As soon as next year, they say, summer days in Mecca could exceed the “extreme danger” heat-stress threshold. The news comes just weeks after over 2 million people completed their journey of a lifetime. The environmental threat to the holy pilgrimage is a panic button for British Muslims like me, signaling that the climate crisis is endangering an age-old sacred rite.

Hajj is a pillar of Islam that I’ve yet to undertake, and the physical endurance required will only become more gruelling in coming decades – scientists predict that heat and humidity levels during hajj will exceed the extreme danger threshold 20% of the time from 2045 and 2053, and 42% of the time between 2079 and 2086.

Environmental stewardship may well be advocated by my faith – the Quran states that humans are appointed as “caretakers of the Earth” and the prophet Muhammad organised the planting of trees and created conservation areas called hima – but it hasn’t mobilised Muslims on a mass scale for what the world needs now: a global eco-jihad.

Fazlun Khalid, founder of Islamic Foundation for Ecology and Environmental Sciences and author of Signs on the Earth: Islam, Modernity and the Climate Crisis, has been on a green mission for over 35 years, but his biggest challenge has been to motivate Muslims. “Islam is inherently environmental, but modernity has induced all of us to distance ourselves from nature. The reason I don’t give up is my grandchildren – what kind of planet will they inherit? How can they perform hajj under those conditions?”

Khalid previously gathered a team of scholars and academics who drafted the Islamic declaration on climate change adopted at the International Islamic climate change symposium in Istanbul in 2015 (an event co-sponsored by Islamic Relief, a global charity that is again calling on Muslims to take action now if they want to safeguard the pilgrimage for future generations). Maria Zafar of Islamic Relief UK said: “Hajj has physically demanding outdoor rituals which can become hazardous to humans. It isn’t only Mecca, other sacred sites will be at risk too, like the religious sites in Jerusalem, the Golden Temple in India – it will affect what we hold dear to our hearts. We think that climate change is distant from us, but there is no area of life that it won’t touch.”

If we are truly to tackle a catastrophe as huge as the climate crisis, we have to make it personal. Without a personal stake, it remains an abstract and we unite in perpetuating it. So if money is the only form of emotional investment for some, and if economics wields more power than the will to save our planet, we must use it. Next year Saudi Arabia is hosting the G20 summit, so let’s pressure the country to consider the financial threat due to a loss of religious tourism. Hajj is lucrative: economic experts have said revenues from hajj and umrah (a lesser pilgrimage undertaken any time of year) are set to exceed $150bn by 2022.

Source: With hajj under threat, it’s time Muslims joined the climate movement

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After euphoria and anxiety, Germans turn pragmatic on immigration – study

2019/08/31 Leave a comment

Interesting:

Germans are broadly positive towards immigration and think it benefits the country, a survey showed, suggesting the often extreme reactions triggered by the arrival of a million-plus refugees there in 2015 have given way to a calmer view.

A long-standing split between attitudes in the more welcoming western Germany and more sceptical former Communist east has also become less marked, Thursday’s Bertelsmann Foundation study revealed – though judged purely on economic factors the differences between the two parts remain acute.

Overall, almost two thirds of Germans believe immigration is good for the economy and 67% that it makes life more interesting, with young people the most positive.

“Germany has passed the stress test of the 2015 immigration wave and has stabilised itself as a pragmatic immigrant country,” foundation board member Joerg Draeger said.

“The population sees the challenges, but also the opportunities it brings for an ageing society.”

Four years ago, Chancellor Angela Merkel chose to leave Germany’s borders open as an unprecedented wave of migrants, many of them fleeing war in Syria, headed for Europe.

While many greeted Merkel’s decision with initial euphoria, a backlash followed, with a jump in support for anti-immigration parties across Europe, one of which, the Alternative for Germany (AfD), entered parliament in 2017 for the first time.

While a sense of unease remains, the intensity of feeling has diminished. Some 49% still think Germany is overburdened with refugees, but that has declined from 54% since 2017.

Some of the divisions between east and west have also narrowed.

A total of 59% of western Germans said refugees were welcome, down from 65% in 2017, while the comparable figure in the poorer east rose to 42% from 33%, the survey showed.

However, as many as 83% in the east – where the AfD is expected to do well in two regional elections on Sunday – still feel immigration is a burden on the welfare state and just a slender majority think it good for the economy.

Source: After euphoria and anxiety, Germans turn pragmatic on immigration – study

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Ontario urged to encourage immigrants to look beyond the GTA

2019/08/31 Leave a comment

Ongoing challenge that most provincial governments are grappling with – how to encourage immigrants to go beyond the largest centres.

Ontario actually does better than most other provinces in this regard, given the number of immigrants and visible minorities in cities such as Ottawa, Hamilton, Kitchener Waterloo, London and Windsor.

The real challenge lies more in rural and northern Ontario.

Ontario must start encouraging immigrants to settle in communities outside the GTA in order to reduce pressure on housing, transit and other infrastructure in the 905 and stimulate growth in the rest of the province, a new report says.

According to the Conference Board of Canada report, 45 per cent of Ontario’s 13.5 million people live in the GTA, but each year almost 80 per cent of new immigrants settling in the province make the region their home, meaning that most of Ontario doesn’t get enough newcomers to sustain their communities, and that even more pressure is being put on an already strained housing pool and other services in the 905.

Last year, 106,000 immigrants settled in the GTA, while just 31,000 made their homes in the rest of Ontario.

“The GTA has the difficult task of integrating large numbers of newcomers into its labour market each year. Nearly half of its newcomers arrive under the family and refugee classes, which means they require more labour market supports than economic class newcomers,” said the 47-page report, “Immigration Beyond the GTA,” being released Thursday.

“On the other hand, some communities across the province — particularly those in Northern Ontario — are in desperate need of immigrants to support their economic health, but less than one-quarter of the province’s newcomers choose to settle outside of the GTA.”

Spreading more immigrants across Ontario is more urgent than ever, the report warns, since demographic pressures, if not addressed, will significantly impact the province’s economic performance over the next two decades, with the average age of residents rising to 44.1 in 2040 from 40.5 in 2017. By 2040, almost a quarter of Ontario’s population will be 65 and over, compared with just 17 per cent in 2017.

While communities outside the GTA do not have the same number of job opportunities, settlement services, cultural amenities, and ethnic diversity, they still offer a range of immigration advantages compared with the GTA, said the report, written by researcher Kareem El-Assal.

With the exception of Barrie, it said, other census metropolitan areas currently all have lower unemployment rates than the GTA. Hamilton, Kingston, Guelph and Kitchener-Cambridge-Waterloo all have unemployment rates below 5 per cent, compared to 6.4 per cent in the 905 area.

Although all levels of government have recognized the need to “regionalize” the distribution of immigration, including the most recent federal pilot program to encourage newcomers to settle in rural and remote communities, the report calls for the creation of a regional strategy led by the province with active participation from municipalities.

Municipalities have had few options in immigrant recruitment because immigration is a shared federal-provincial jurisdiction. However, the report said all three levels of government can draw inspiration from Canada’s latest international post-secondary education strategy, which has successfully brought all players to the table to promote the “regionalization” of foreign students across the country.

The study said a regionalization strategy must set targets to ensure half of newcomers to the province settle outside of the 905. The province should juggle the point grids of the provincial immigrant nomination programs by rewarding applicants with community and family ties outside of the GTA because those are among the most important considerations for newcomer settlement.

A 2016 evaluation of Nova Scotia’s various provincial immigration streams found that 82 per cent of those who arrived under the community identified class with strong ties to an established cultural community had continued to stay in Nova Scotia instead of moving to other provinces.

Given immigrants always go where the job opportunities are, the report suggested business groups such as chambers of commerce take the lead in sharing information with local employers on hiring newcomers, creating a welcoming and inclusive environment and tapping existing newcomer communities to reach out to immigrant talent.

“Ontario municipalities must showcase their leadership. One way they can do this is by ensuring they have immigration strategies of their own in place,” said the Conference Board. “This is crucial to signalling their intention that they want to welcome more immigrants and will take all necessary steps to succeed.”

Source: Ontario urged to encourage immigrants to look beyond the GTA

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Migrants irréguliers: Ottawa verse 250 millions à Québec

2019/08/31 Leave a comment

Hard to disagree with the principle.

However, important not to forget that Quebec has a sweetheart deal with respect to the amount transferred annually for economic immigrant selection and settlement services (all categories) that is based on the percentage of of Quebec’s population, not the percentage of immigrants.

Given the current cuts in Quebec levels, and the increase in Canadian ones, the imbalance continues to increase:

À l’approche des élections fédérales, le gouvernement Trudeau sort le chéquier pour régler un différend avec Québec: il versera à la province 250 millions de dollars en guise de compensation pour les coûts liés au soutien des milliers de migrants qui ont franchi la frontière de manière irrégulière en 2017 et en 2018.

Le ministre des Finances, Bill Morneau, a confirmé cette décision par voie de communiqué jeudi après-midi, permettant ainsi au gouvernement Trudeau de tourner la page sur un dossier qui avait provoqué des frictions entre les deux capitales.

Depuis 2017, quelque 43 000 personnes sont entrées au pays de manière irrégulière. Plus de 90% d’entre elles ont franchi la frontière canado-américaine en passant par le chemin Roxham, près du poste frontalier de Lacolle.

«L’augmentation au cours des deux dernières années du nombre de migrants irréguliers qui entrent au Canada par le Québec a imposé au gouvernement du Québec des pressions particulières et sans précédent. Nous apprécions sa collaboration pour la gestion de cet enjeu», a affirmé le ministre Morneau.

Selon lui, le financement accordé au gouvernement du Québec devrait permettre de défrayer l’ensemble des couts extraordinaires liés à l’afflux de demandeurs d’asile en 2017 et 2018.

À Québec, le gouvernement Legault a fait savoir que l’entente conclue avec Ottawa ouvre la porte à d’autres compensations pour les dépenses liées au passage de demandeurs d’asile pour l’année en cours, une fois que leur nombre total sera connu.

En outre, les fonctionnaires de Québec et d’Ottawa poursuivent les négociations afin d’établir un mécanisme de répartition qui doit permettre de rediriger plus rapidement les demandeurs d’asile vers leur province de destination après leur arrivée à la frontière canadienne.

«Pour le Québec, il était primordial de compenser toutes les dépenses extraordinaires encourues pour les demandeurs d’asile au cours des années 2017 et 2018. Après plusieurs mois de négociations, nous avons obtenu le remboursement complet de nos dépenses pour les années 2017 et 2018 ainsi que l’engagement du Canada de rembourser les sommes encourues pour 2019. Il s’agit d’une avancée majeure et cela confirme le rôle du Québec en matière d’immigration», a affirmé le ministre de l’Immigration, de la Diversité et de l’Inclusion, Simon Jolin-Barrette,

Dans le passé, les partis de l’opposition ont accusé à plusieurs reprises le gouvernement Trudeau d’avoir perdu le contrôle de la gestion de la frontière avec les Etats-Unis.

«Le gouvernement du Canada vise d’abord et avant tout à assurer la bonne gestion du système canadien d’immigration et d’asile et à faire en sorte que les flux de migration soient gérés de façon sécuritaire et ordonnée. Le gouvernement du Québec a été et continue d’être un partenaire extraordinaire. Nous sommes impatients de poursuivre notre étroite collaboration avec lui», a pour sa part déclaré le ministre de la Sécurité frontalière et de la Réduction du crime organisé, Bill Blair.

Dans le passé, les partis de l’opposition ont accusé à plusieurs reprises le gouvernement Trudeau d’avoir perdu le contrôle de la gestion de la frontière avec les États-Unis.

Dans un rapport publié en novembre dernier, le directeur parlementaire du budget Yves Giroux estimait que cet afflux de migrants qui traversent la frontière de façon irrégulière a coûté pas moins de 340 millions de dollars au gouvernement fédéral seulement en 2017-2018.

Source: Migrants irréguliers: Ottawa verse 250 millions à Québec

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Vancouver broadcaster resigns after outcry over Hong Kong remarks

2019/08/30 Leave a comment

Public pressure in action:

An on-air columnist at Vancouver’s most-listened-to Chinese radio station has resigned after making controversial remarks about the protests in Hong Kong, suggesting pro-democracy demonstrators were partly responsible for a violent incident last month.

The remarks last week by Thomas Leung prompted an outcry from members of Vancouver’s sizeable Hong Kong expatriate community. In the opinion piece on Fairchild Radio, Mr. Leung questioned the innocence of some Hong Kong protesters, who were attacked by a mob of suspected triad gangsters.

Mr. Leung called the July 21 attack “a fight between black and white.”

He was referring to protesters, who usually wear black, and the gang of white-shirted men armed with metal rods and wooden poles who beat up anti-government protesters and others inside a subway station in the Yuen Long neighbourhood, injuring about 45 people, including journalists and a legislator.

In his commentary, which has since been removed online by Fairchild but still exists on other websites, Mr. Leung suggests some pro-democracy protesters, brought by a Democratic lawmaker, provoked those in the white shirts.

The remarks, aired through Fairchild Radio’s Cantonese channel AM 1470 last Wednesday, drew huge backlash online. Hong Kongers and Canadians who have ties to Hong Kong condemned Mr. Leung for twisting the facts and called his comments “false.”

They also encouraged each other to complain to the radio station and the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council (CBSC), a self-governing regulatory body for Canada’s private broadcasters. According to a note posted on CBSC’s website, the organization has received a large number of complaints about comments made on the News Talk program, which exceeded the CBSC’s technical processing capacities.

Two days after the incident, Fairchild radio announced Mr. Leung’s resignation through a Facebook post.

“Due to personal reasons, Dr. Thomas Leung has submitted his resignation to Fairchild Radio as of August 22, and has left the ‘News Talk’ program on AM 1470 with immediate effect.”

Travena Lee, news director at Fairchild Radio, said Tuesday the station has no further comment.

Soon after Fairchild’s announcement, Mr. Leung also posted a statement on his public Facebook page, saying what he said in the program were “comments” rather than “news.”

“In my original commentary, I first pointed out that it was wrong for the white-clad men dashing to the subway station and beat people. I also pointed out that, the confrontation between two sides eventually became fights, based upon different videos and reporting from that day,” Mr. Leung said in the post.

He added that different editing of videos from the Yuen Long attack may lead to different opinions.

However, he said, according to various videos, “[I] still saw the clips that both sides fought each other and that’s why I called it the fight between black and white.”

Hong Kong people have called for an investigation of the mob attack. And Mr. Leung stated he too welcomed the investigation, and will apologize if it can be proven that protesters didn’t do anything to provoke the violent clashes.

Mr. Leung is also the president of a non-profit organization called the Culture Regeneration Research Society. A staff member with the organization said Mr. Leung was not available for an interview on Tuesday.

Leo Shin, associate professor of history and Asian studies at University of British Columbia, said as a commentator, Mr. Leung is entitled to his views. But he noted Mr. Leung’s opinion isn’t widely shared.

“That observation on his part is not in accordance to what most people [saw] who were there, or who have viewed the footage either online or through TV.”

Prof. Shin said the Yuen Long incident was a “watershed moment” in the protests, which provoked outrage among Hong Kongers not only because of the attack, but also because of the slow response from Hong Kong police.

Source: Vancouver broadcaster resigns after outcry over Hong Kong remarks

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Québec dit non aux parents refusant que leurs enfants aient une enseignante voilée

2019/08/30 Leave a comment

Small solace for the grandfathered (or grandfathered) teachers who are exempt from Bill 21:

Le gouvernement Legault dit non aux parents qui voudraient changer leur enfant de classe si l’enseignante porte le voile.

Le ministre de l’Éducation, Jean-François Roberge, a ainsi réagi à une lettre ouverte publiée dans le quotidien Le Devoir mercredi.

Les signataires demandent, si l’enseignant porte un signe religieux, de pouvoir changer leur enfant de classe, au nom du « droit à des institutions et des services publics laïques », tel qu’inscrit dans la Loi sur la laïcité de l’État adoptée en juin.

En mêlée de presse mercredi matin avant de se rendre à la séance du cabinet Legault, le ministre Roberge a rapidement fermé la porte à leur requête.

Selon ses mots, il n’appartient pas aux parents de choisir ou de magasiner leur enseignant. Il a ajouté que cela n’est pas prévu dans la loi sur la laïcité et que le gouvernement n’a pas l’intention d’aller dans cette direction.

Source: Québec dit non aux parents refusant que leurs enfants aient une enseignante voilée

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Hong Kong: Split emerges in Vancouver’s Chinese-Canadian community amid protests

2019/08/30 Leave a comment

Ongoing:

Images of police using rubber bullets and tear gas against protesters in Hong Kong in early June spurred Joel Wan to pick up the phone and call the United Nations human rights office from his home in Vancouver.

“It was 3 a.m. and I was watching live on my computer. I can’t just sit there and watch, so I have to report this somewhere immediately,” recalled Wan, who is 18 and was born in Hong Kong.

Wan called the actions of police in Hong Kong a “trigger” for him, although he was already concerned about a proposed extradition bill that sparked the ongoing mass protests in the semi-autonomous Chinese territory.

The bill, which has since been suspended, would have allowed certain suspects to be extradited to mainland China to face charges, a move Wan and others in Canada view as a blow to Hong Kong’s legal independence.

In response, Wan helped form a group called Vancouver Hong Kong Political Activists, which aims to shed light on what he sees as the erosion of democratic freedoms in Hong Kong.

“When I’m enjoying the freedom and human rights in Canada, and myself being a part of Hong Kong identity, I have a greater responsibility to speak up for the people when they can’t,” said Wan in a recent interview.

“I decided to step up to let Canadians hear what we’re saying.”

Earlier this month, the political climate in Hong Kong spilled into the streets of Vancouver as an event organized by Wan’s group sparked a counter-rally by supporters of China’s central government and the Hong Kong police.

As many as 300,000 Canadians live in Hong Kong, according to the Asia Pacific Foundation, and more than 200,000 people living in Canada were born in Hong Kong.

Members of the Chinese-Canadian community in the Lower Mainland say the question of how tensions are playing out in the region is a complicated one.

The extradition bill has been suspended, but protesters want it off the legislative table altogether. The movement’s demands have also expanded to include universal suffrage when electing Hong Kong’s leaders, amnesty for protesters who have been arrested and an independent investigation into the use of force by Hong Kong police.

Wan supports the Hong Kong activists’ goals.

“It’s not just the amendment of the bill,” he said. “It’s because we can’t vote for a government that serves us truly.”

The United Nations has also released a statement on behalf of its high commissioner for human rights, Michelle Bachelet, indicating there was “credible evidence” of Hong Kong law enforcement officials using measures “prohibited by international norms and standards.” Bachelet condemned any form of violence, calling on protesters to “express their views in a peaceful way” and urging Hong Kong authorities to investigate police actions immediately.

It was in hopes of raising awareness about events in Hong Kong that Wan said his group planned to hand out flyers at a transit station near Vancouver’s city hall on Aug. 17.

But on that day, Wan found himself in the centre of duelling rallies, a reflection of tensions between pro-democracy protesters and those who are aligned with Beijing and law enforcement in Hong Kong.

“I didn’t expect there would be a stand-off,” said Wan, who donned a mask for the first time that day, concealing his face after becoming aware of threatening messages shared on WeChat, a Chinese social media and mobile payment app.

Wan believes many of those at the counter-rally were spurred on by the Chinese consulate, which denied any involvement in a statement.

“It is totally understandable and reasonable for local overseas Chinese to express indignation and opposition against words and deeds that attempt to separate China and smear its image,” the consulate said in an email to The Canadian Press.

“Some western media have repeatedly targeted at Chinese government and its diplomatic missions overseas by misleading implications and groundless accusations, to which we firmly oppose.”

Vancouver police say protests on Aug. 17 and 18 were of comparable size, attracting about 400 people evenly split between the two sides. Const. Steve Addison said police are aware of what is being said on social media and they are monitoring to determine risk levels, as they do for any demonstration. No other action has been taken by police, he said.

Similar protests were also held that weekend in Toronto.

At the first rally in Vancouver, those sympathetic to the Chinese government chanted “One China,” while the pro-democracy supporters chanted “two systems.”

Wan said he and his group are not calling for Hong Kong’s independence, but they do want the “one country, two systems” agreement upheld, a reference to the implementation of the governance structure that was brought in when Hong Kong was reunified with China in 1997 after more than 150 years of British rule.

“The two systems, for Hong Kongers, they feel have been eroded, step by step,” said Josephine Chiu-Duke, a professor in the department of Asian studies at the University of British Columbia and a specialist in Chinese intellectual history.

Chiu-Duke considers the latest round of demonstrations to be an extension of the ongoing struggle to defend the rights promised to Hong Kong residents when the region became semi-autonomous more than 20 years ago.

Indeed, Wan said, “They broke their promise.”

Most people in the pro-democracy camp believe the erosion is backed by the Beijing government to gradually unify the two systems, Chiu-Duke noted.

“They want the Beijing government to honour their promise to Hong Kong’s people (and) let the rule of law rule Hong Kong,” she said, adding that many people in the Lower Mainland with roots in Hong Kong want to let the pro-democracy protesters know they’re not alone.

As for the crowds near city hall earlier this month, Chiu-Duke said it’s hard to pin down why the demonstrators supporting the Chinese government showed up.

“There are rumours they were basically organized by the Chinese consulate,” said Chiu-Duke, pointing to reports that a spokesman for China’s foreign affairs ministry stated the government hopes “overseas Chinese can express their patriotism in a rational way.”

At the rally, Nicholas Wang said he helped organize the “One China” group and that he supports the police in Hong Kong.

“Our idea is just against violence, that’s the most important thing,” said Wang, who is from mainland China and attributes violent clashes in Hong Kong to the protesters.

Wang acknowledged that those who supported the protesters in Hong Kong at the rally in Vancouver were also opposed to violence.

“It’s perfect that they support the same idea with us,” Wang said in an interview.

But he believes they are only talking about one side of the story.

“I think you can find more videos of more younger people creating chaos there instead of police doing that,” said Wang, adding that if police didn’t carry out their duties, Hong Kong would degenerate into chaos.

Chinese exchange student Erika Zhao also blamed violence on the protesters and said journalists are only focusing on the actions of the police.

“It’s quite biased news,” she said.

Despite the tense face-off in Vancouver, Joel Wan said he is on good terms with friends who disagree with him.

“Most of the mainland (Chinese) people I encounter are willing to engage into our conversation,” said Wan. “One of my friends, he entirely believed we are rioters and we are messing up the city. After explanation, we still stand strong in our opinions, but we established agreement (and) understanding (on) why each other thinks like that.”

Most people Wan knows are also focused on life in Vancouver and aren’t as involved with what’s happening in Hong Kong, he said.

It’s a sentiment shared by Calvin Lam, 23, who was born in Vancouver and raised in Hong Kong before returning to B.C. as a university student.

Lam was on vacation in Hong Kong in early June when the protests began to escalate.

He said he was sympathetic to their cause until Hong Kong’s chief executive, Carrie Lam, announced the suspension of the extradition bill. At that point, Lam said the protesters achieved their objective and the rest of their demands are unrealistic.

He said he’s concerned that ongoing mass protests, altercations between protesters and police, destruction of property and disruptions in Hong Kong’s airport and transit systems are damaging Hong Kong’s economy and reputation.

But, like Wan, Lam said he approaches friends who disagree with him amicably.

“They have their stance, I understand it. I am careful in what I say to them. I never use any personal attacks,” said Lam, in reference to derogatory name-calling that has been levelled online at pro-democracy protesters.

“We just know this issue is happening in Hong Kong and then I’m psychologically or emotionally affected because I see Hong Kong as my homeland. But I don’t think any other areas of my life are affected.”

Source: Hong Kong: Split emerges in Vancouver’s Chinese-Canadian community amid protests

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