National security law to bring HK a thriving future: Martin Jacques
By Jiang Yunan
People's Daily app
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With the national security law in place, Hong Kong can restore stability and revive the economy to a thriving future, British scholar Martin Jacques said Monday on Twitter. 

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Hong Kong citizens celebrate the passage of the Law of the People's Republic of China on Safeguarding National Security in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) in Causeway Bay of south China's Hong Kong, June 30, 2020. (Photo: Xinhua)

Jacques started with highlighting the necessity of establishing the national security law by saying "Every country needs national security laws - the riots proved it." At the same time, he refuted the idea that the legislation will nullify the "one country, two systems".

"Is this the end of 1 country 2 systems? No," Jacques wrote. "But it is the end of the era when UK/US could try and undermine it both from within and without. "

Jacques argues that Hong Kong still has a colonial-style economy that benefits the tycoons, which adds to the urgency of introducing relevant reforms.

"Hong Kong needs major socio-economic with lines of China's economic transformation: competitive, innovation, broad-based," He wrote. "Hong Kong's future lies not in looking westwards, to a stagnating and crisis-ridden UK, or to an America that is in free fall, but becoming part of the southern Chinese economy, probably the most dynamic in the world." 

Jacques is the senior fellow of the China Institute at Fudan University. He is a journalist, columnist, broadcaster and speaker on East Asian issues. Jacques is also the author of the global best-seller “When China Rules the World: the End of the Western World and the Birth of a New Global Order.”