
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Tuesday slammed China's 'Orwellian' censorship moves in Hong Kong.
''With the ink barely dry on the draconian National Security Law, Hong Kong authorities are now removing books from libraries, banning political slogans, and requiring censorship in schools,'' he said in a tweet.
''The US condemns these Orwellian assaults on the rights and freedoms of the Hong Kong people,'' he added.
Hours after China passed the draconian national security law on the finance hub, books written by prominent Hong Kong democracy activists have started disappearing from the city's libraries in the aftermath of China imposing a draconian national security law on the finance hub.
Beijing's new national security law is the most radical shift in how the semi-autonomous city is run since it was handed back to China by Britain in 1997.
Among the authors whose titles are no longer available are Joshua Wong, one of the city's most prominent young activists, and Tanya Chan, a well known pro-democracy lawmaker. Searches on the public library website showed at least three titles by Wong, Chan and local scholar Chin Wan are no longer available for lending at any of dozens of outlets across the city.
The local government recently said that the popular protest slogan "Liberate Hong Kong, the revolution of our times" would now be deemed illegal.
For some, the phrase represents genuine aspirations to split Hong Kong from China, a red line for Beijing, but for many others, it is a more general cry for democracy and an expression of rising frustration with Chinese rule.