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Chinese authorities presented on Thursday plans to circumventHong Kong’s legislatureto invent a nationwide security law that pro-democracy campaigners inform is aimed at cracking down on dissent within the metropolis.

A circulation to enable the drafting of the law—which targets secession, sedition, terrorism and international interference in Hong Kong—used to be brought earlier than the National Members’s Congress (NPC), China’s lawmaking physique, at its annual meeting in Beijing on Friday.

“National security is the bedrock underpinning a nation’s steadiness,”NPC spokesman Zhang Yesui knowledgeable media in Beijing on Thursday. “Safeguarding nationwide security serves the fundamental pursuits of all Chinese language of us, collectively with our Hong Kong compatriots.”

The introduction of the legislation has sparked difficulty and outrage from pro-democracy figures in Hong Kong, who inform that Beijing has reneged on guarantees made it made when it took serve the oldschool British colony in 1997. Hong Kong used to be guaranteed a high stage of autonomy and an unprejudiced judiciary for a length of 50 years below a political mannequin dubbed“one nation, two programs.”

“Right here’s the stop of Hong Kong. Right here’s the stop of one nation, two programs. Fabricate no mistake about it,” pro-democracy lawmaker Dennis Kwok knowledgeable TIME.

Right here’s what to know relating to the contentious nationwide security law.

What’s it?

BelowArticle 23of Hong Kong’s Total Law, the mini-structure governing the territory, the Hong Kong authorities must invent guidelines to prohibit acts love treason, secession, sedition, and subversion in opposition to the Chinese language authorities and the theft of command secrets and ideas. The local authorities’s failure to get such guidelines through the legislature is the explanation that Beijing now takes matters into its have hands.

When the Hong Kong authorities attempted to introduce nationwide security legislation in 2003, an estimated 500,000 of us became outto inform in opposition to the invoice on July 1, 2003—the finest inform the metropolis had seen since its handover from the U.Ok. The invoice used to be sooner or later shelved.

Since then, the metropolis’s authorities hasn’t attempted to introduce the legislation again, even though pro-Beijing politicians get called for its revival on loads of occasions. Hong Kong’s embattled leader, Chief Executive Carrie Lam, has over and over acknowledged that passing the invoice would require thelawful timing and prerequisites.

Stress to invent the invoice has elevated since widespreadunrest erupted in June 2019.

Why does Beijing must bound this now?

Experts inform that Beijing has grown weary of looking at for the local authorities to invent nationwide security legislation.

“I mediate they’ve lost patience that Article 23 would be handed by the Legislative Council,” Willy Lam, an adjunct professor on the Chinese language College of Hong Kong’s Middle for China Reports, tells TIME. “Right here’s an on the spot plot of imposing a nationwide security law on Hong Kong.”

Excellent year’s protests get also elevated Beijing’s want to crack down in Hong Kong. Thein general violent demonstrations—which began over an extradition invoice that would get allowed suspected criminals to face trial in mainland China—jumpy noteworthy of the metropolis for the length of the 2d half of 2019.

Aneditorialprinted on Thursday by the command-trotChinaEach dayacknowledged that the law will act as a deterrent to extra protests: “The introduction of the legislation will present the lawful basis for concrete actions to envision the escalation of violence in [Hong Kong], and act as a deterrent to expedite the restoration of public inform.”

Excellent year’s protesters mostly alive to on getting the extradition invoice withdrawn, fearing that it’d be feeble to spherical up dissidents within the territory. As well they called for Lam’s ouster and an unprejudiced investigation of police behavior for the length of the protests. But some fringe groups get called for independence from China and the premise of secession has been broadly debated. “Liberate Hong Kong, revolution of our time,” a phrase first feeble by jailedHong Kong separatist Edward Leung, became a most trendy inform slogan.

Chinese language authorities get on a pair of occasions accused“international forces”of being within the serve of the unrest.

“Crucial measures must aloof be taken—in step with the law—to shut, close and punish international and distant places forces utilizing Hong Kong to behavior separatist, subversion, infiltration and negative behavior,”in step with a documentlaunched by a Chinese language authorities spokesman on Friday.

Beijing’s enviornment has taken on a original urgency with the deterioration of family with Washington. The look of Hong Kong protesters waving the Stars and Stripes at protests has provoked madden and fright amongst many mainland Chinese language.

Why is it a huge deal?

Critics argue that the introduction of the legislation spells the death of Hong Kong’s racy political mannequin.

“This day I mediate is the saddest day in Hong Kong history,” pro-democracy lawmaker Tanya Chan acknowledged at a Thursday evening press convention. “It confirms one nation, one machine.”

Reliable-democracy lawmakerClaudia Motells TIME the legislation, enacted outdoor of Hong Kong’s have legislative job, is the “final nail in [the] coffin” for Hong Kong’s autonomy.

Experts inform that the legislation will surely encroach on the freewheeling metropolis’s freedoms, which get already been backsliding. As an instance,press freedomhas been on the decline and loads of different activists serious of Beijing get been denied entry to Hong Kong in present months.

Jean-Pierre Cabestan, a professor of political science at Hong Kong Baptist College, tells TIME there are usually serious implications throughout Hong Kong’s civil society—from local activists to expatriates and NGOs.

“The massive ask is whether it’s going to narrow civil liberties, public freedoms, political freedoms noteworthy extra—are we lively from a hybrid machine which we’ve had for the explanation that handover to a extra authoritarian machine?” asks Cabestan.

China has feeble its have nationwide security guidelines to crack down on activists, journalists, lawyers and other human rights defenders. As an instance,Nobel laureate Liu Xiaobo,who spoke out on components love democracy and human-rights, used to be jailed in 2009 on prices of “inciting subversion in opposition to command vitality.”

Critics of the proposed law inform that this could maybe get a chilling construct on dissenting voices.

“That is also feeble to silence of us, your complete opposition, every the average fragment and the novel one,” pro-democracy politicianEddie Chutells TIME. “This nationwide security ordinance will seemingly be feeble as a instrument to threaten trendy residents and to criminalize of us that dare to voice out.”

Chu provides that the nationwide security legislation will essentially force Hong Kong to honest bring collectively China’s law enforcement and the lawful machine. “The total things we difficulty which would be going on to human rights activists in mainland China will happen lawful in Hong Kong.”

What happens next?

China’s National Members’s Congress is predicted to vote on the circulation on the stop of its annual session, seemingly to be spherical Could maybe 28. Even supposing important aspects of the original legislation aloof must be ironed out, the the draft will seemingly be authorized for promulgation in Hong Kong by the stop of the next meeting of theNPC Standing Committee,that can also honest be as early as June, in step withtheSouth China MorningPost.

It’s unclear if the details will spark one other wave of mass demonstrations, even though puny protests get been begun cropping up again in present weeks as coronavirus instances dwindle within the metropolis. Some puny groups of protesters gathered in totally different areas spherical the metropolis to inform on Friday.

“It’s a ways seemingly to be complex for the pro-democracy politicians to infuriate the ardour of classy of us to hit the streets in inform,” says Willy Lam, the Chinese language College of Hong Kong professor. “I mediate a share of of us are resigned to the inevitable.”

What’s determined is that the legislation is seemingly to fundamentally switch Hong Kong’s relationship with the United States. In November 2019, after practically six months of legit-democracy protests in Hong Kong, President Donald Trump signed into law bipartisan legislation aimed at safeguarding Hong Kong’s civil rights and freedoms.The Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Acthyperlinks the financial hub’s special change space to continued autonomy from Beijing.

The act requires an annual overview for Hong Kong to proceed to qualify for Washington’s favorable trading terms. Secretary of Utter Mike Pompeo acknowledged in early Could maybe that the first overview could maybe maybe be delayed unless after the Could maybe 22 NPC meeting, to set in mind any actions which can also honest construct Hong Kong.

The U.S. on Thursday eveningissued a stern warningto China in opposition to imposing the law on Hong Kong, announcing a high-level of autonomy and admire for human rights get been key to conserving the enclave’s special space. “Any effort to impose nationwide security legislation that doesn’t replicate the need of the of us of Hong Kong could maybe maybe be extremely destabilizing, and could maybe maybe be met with strong condemnation from the United States and the worldwide neighborhood,” Utter Department spokeswoman Morgan Ortagus acknowledged in emailed comments.

But consultants inform worldwide pressure isn’t going to interchange Beijing’s mind. “It’s now not going to get any impact on Beijing’s policy in direction of Hong Kong,” says Cabestan. I mediate they’ve made their decision.”

Write toAmy Gunia atamy.gunia@time.com.