Let me add just one point to your report, “Beijing warns it can send army into Hong Kong” (July 24). The arrangement for the Chinese garrison in Hong Kong is found not only in the Hong Kong Garrison Law as you reported. It is stipulated also in Article 14 of the Hong Kong Basic Law in exactly the same words, ie “The Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region may, when necessary, ask the Central People’s Government for assistance from the garrison in the maintenance of public order and in disaster relief.”The Basic Law was passed in 1990, seven years before Hong Kong reverted to China.In passing I should also mention that the Chinese garrison in Hong Kong, rather like the British garrison here before 1997, is not meant to be token, ceremonial or symbolic.
CY Leung