The foreign minister of China will visit Sweden, Denmark, Norway and Finland during 2-8 July. For all host nations, human rights are central to their foreign policy. After the imposition of Beijing’s National security law for Hong Kong in 2020, the human rights situation has changed catastrophically.

We urge the hosts to live up to their stated commitments and coordinate their objections to the Chinese government’s violations of the Sino-British Joint Declaration, and Hong Kong’s Basic Law as adopted in 1997. Below, we suggest four topics that should be raised by all Nordic governments on this occasion.

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Free Gui Minhai

After having lived four years in Sweden, Gui Minhai became a citizen in 1992. He moved to Hong Kong in 2012, and worked there as a book publisher and writer. While on vacation in Thailand in 2015 he was abducted and taken to China1. He has been in detention and imprisoned since that time. Since 2020 he has been serving a 10 year sentence after having been found guilty of fabricated charges of providing intelligence to foreign entities2.

Neither his family, nor (to the best of our knowledge) Swedish representatives have been in contact with Gui since 2018. This situation is unbearable for his family, and constitutes a blatant violation of the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations.

We urge the Nordic governments to

• resolutely reject the Chinese position that Gui Minhai is not a Swedish citizen

• insist that Swedish authorities and the International Red Cross are immediately granted visitation access to Gui Minhai

• demand that Gui Minhai is set free and is allowed to travel to Sweden with no unnecessary delay
   

Free Jimmy Lai and all political prisoners in Hong Kong

Jimmy Lai is a British citizen who worked as a media entrepreneur in Hong Kong, and a human rights and democracy activist. He has spent the last 5.5 years in prison, and is presently serving a 20 years sentence for collusion and sedition. Like other opposition figures who have worked selflessly to promote the democracy that Hong Kong was promised in the Basic Law3, he has been jailed for exercising his rights under the law4.

Jimmy Lai has always advocated for and lived by the principle of non-violence. Even so, he is kept in Stanley Prison, a maximum security facility with stone and metal cells that lack air conditioning in the city’s tropical heat and humidity5. Jimmy Lai is a 78 year old diabetic who is spending almost all time in isolation in a bug-infested environment under conditions that surpasses the standard for torture. This concern was raised by the UN Working group on arbitrary detention in 2024, who also called for his immediate and unconditional release6. That position has also been adopted by The Diplomatic Service of the European Union7.

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We ask the Nordic governments to

• urge the Chinese government to repeal Beijing’s National security law for Hong Kong, thus aligning with the position of the U.N. Human Rights Committee8

• insist that Jimmy Lai is released unconditionally, as he has committed no crime against the 1997 Basic Law, and also from a humanitarian perspective

• call for the release all political prisoners who have been sentenced for violation of laws that infringe upon rights promised in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
   

Fight transnational repression

The Hong Kong government is abusing national security legislation for the purpose of transnational repression. Presently, 34 overseas Hongkongers are targeted with arrest warrants and bounties9, for advocating for human rights and non-violent opposition to the Hong Kong government. Their family members who reside in Hong Kong have been systematically harassed by the Hong Kong police. Kwok Yin-sang, the father of one of the wanted exiles, has received a 8 month prison sentence for terminating his daughter’s insurance policy10.

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All U.N. member states, including the People’s Republic of China, are committed to uphold the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The extraterritorial man-hunt of human rights defenders is a brazen violation of national sovereignty. This policy of repression has already reached beyond theory: In June, two British-Chinese dual citizens were handed extensive prison sentences in the U.K. The judge had “no doubt” that the men’s criminal activities contributed to the “fear, insecurity and distress for those targeted [Hongkongers]”11.

 

During the upcoming meetings we urge the Nordic governments to

• state that Chinese interference by transnational repression is completely unacceptable in general, and specifically in the Nordic countries, and would have detrimental effects on Sino-Nordic relations

• explicitly commit to all Nordic residents’ right to engage internationally in support of universal human rights, without interference from foreign governments

• demand that the arrest warrants are lifted, that the persecution of family members in Hong Kong is immediately brought to an end, and that Kwok Yin-sang is released from prison
   

Demand that the PRC lives up to its international obligations

The catastrophic development for human rights in Hong Kong is due to Beijing’s National Security Law for Hong Kong12, the Safeguarding National Security Ordinance13 and the recent subsidiary legislation that gives Hong Kong’s Chief Executive the power to designate criminal cases as national security cases14, thus directly opening the door for political interference in the judiciary.
 

All of this legislation contravenes

• China’s obligation under the U.N. registered Sino-British Joint Declaration15

• guarantees given to the people of Hong Kong in the 1997 Hong Kong Basic Law (see above)

• the stated commitments to democracy and human rights in the Hong Kong-EFTA free trade agreement16, to which the Nordic countries of Norway and Iceland are parties
   

The Nordic governments should jointly advocate for a future where promises for democracy in the 1997 Basic Law are carried through. We know that the situation in Hong Kong is unlikely to reverse in the short term. The struggle for universal human rights requires sustained, lasting and coordinated efforts by supporting organizations and governments.

 

About The European Hong Kong Diaspora Alliance:

The European Hong Kong Diaspora Alliance is a coalition of organizations and individuals across Europe dedicated to supporting the Hong Kong diaspora and advocating for the rights and freedoms of the people of Hong Kong. 

Organisational members:

Befria Hongkong (Sweden)

Finnish Hongkongers (Finland)

Freiheit für Hongkong (Germany)

Hong Kong Committee in Norway (Norway)

Hongkongi Maja (Estonia)

Netherlands for Hong Kong (Netherlands)

PL4HK (Poland)

Støt Hongkong (Denmark)

 

Information sources

1 Gui Minhai’s last days in Thailand (Safeguard defenders, https://safeguarddefenders.com/en/blog/gui-minhais-last-days-thailand)

2 China: Bookseller handed outrageous 10-year sentence must be released (Amnesty International, https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2020/02/china-bookseller-handed-outrageous-10-year-sentence-must-be-released/)

3 Hong Kong Basic Law, Articles 45 and 68 (https://www.basiclaw.gov.hk/en/basiclaw/index.html)

4 Hong Kong Basic Law, Articles 27 and 39

5 Hong Kong Is Torturing Jimmy Lai (Domino Theory, https://dominotheory.com/hong-kong-is-torturing-jimmy-lai/)

6 Opinions adopted by the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention: Opinion No. 34/2024 concerning Mr. Jimmy Lai Chee-ying (see items 60 and 117; https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/documents/issues/detention-wg/opinions/session100/a-hrc-wgad-2024-34-china-hong-kong-advance.pdf)

7 Statement by the Spokesperson on the verdict in the Jimmy Lai case (The Diplomatic Service of the European Union, https://www.eeas.europa.eu/eeas/hong-kong-statement-spokesperson-verdict-jimmy-lai-case-15-december-2025_en)

8 Concluding observations on the fourth periodic report of Hong Kong, China (see item 14a; U.N. Human Rights Committee, https://ishr.ch/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/CCPR_C_CHN-HKG_CO_4_49295_E.pdf)

9 Timeline of Arrest Warrants and Bounties Issued for Overseas Hong Kongers (Brian Kern/Kong Tsung-gan Substack, https://briankernkongtsunggan.substack.com/p/timeline-of-arrest-warrants-and-bounties)

10 Father of Hong Kong activist sentenced to eight months in prison (BBC, https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c3ew7d0e382o)

11 Border Force officer and Hong Kong trade official jailed for spying for China (The Guardian, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/jun/18/border-force-officer-and-hong-kong-trade-official-jailed-for-spying-for-china)

12 2020 Hong Kong national security law (Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_Hong_Kong_national_security_law)

13 Safeguarding National Security Ordinance (Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Safeguarding_National_Security_Ordinance)

14 New powers for Chief Executive in ‘national security’ cases undermine fair trial rights (Amnesty International, https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2026/06/hong-kong-new-powers-for-chief-executive-in-national-security-cases-undermine-fair-trial-rights/)

15 Sino-British Joint Declaration (Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sino-British_Joint_Declaration)

16 Free Trade Agreement between the EFTA states and Hong Kong, China (Preamble; https://www.efta.int/sites/default/files/media/documents/legal-texts/free-trade-relations/hong-kong-china/EFTA-Hong%20Kong%20China%20Free%20Trade%20Agreement.pdf)