Hong Kong businesses vows to strike as leaders remain defiant over extradition bill

Scores of Hong Kong businesses have vowed to shut down as anger builds over government plans to push through a law allowing extraditions to China despite a huge weekend protest.

The financial hub was rocked by a huge rally on Sunday – the largest since the city’s 1997 return to China – as vast crowds called on the city’s leaders to scrap the Beijing-backed plan.

Many are fearful that the proposal will tangle people up in the mainland’s opaque courts and hammer Hong Kong’s reputation as an international business hub.

The extradition bill, which has generated unusually broad opposition at home and abroad and plunged the city into political crisis, is due for a second round of debate on Wednesday in the city’s 70-seat Legislative Council (LegCo). The legislature is controlled by a pro-Beijing majority.

Organisers said more than a million hit the streets but the record crowds have failed to sway chief executive Carrie Lam who has rejected calls to withdraw or delay the bill.

Business owners have taken to social media using a hashtag that translates as “612strike” – referring to 12 June, the date of Wednesday’s bill readings – to announce solidarity closures, allowing staff to join the protest.

By Tuesday morning, more than 100 businesses had declared plans to strike, ranging from coffee shops and restaurants to camera stores, toy shops, nail salons, yoga studios and even an adult entertainment store.

The proposed law would allow extraditions to any jurisdiction with which it does not already have a treaty – including mainland China.

Hong Kong’s leaders say it is needed to plug loopholes and to stop the city being a sanctuary for fugitives.

They say safeguards are in place to ensure human rights standards are upheld and that political critics of Beijing will not be targeted.

But many Hong Kongers have little faith in those assurances after years of political unrest caused by heightened fears a resurgent Beijing is trying to quash the city’s unique freedoms and culture.