New Delhi: The US government has announced visa restrictions on Chinese Communist Party officials over the National Security Law imposed on Hong Kong. The US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced on Friday that they were following up on US President Donald Trump's promise to punish the  Chinese Communist Party officials.

“President Trump promised to punish the Chinese Communist Party officials responsible for eviscerating Hong Kong’s freedoms. Today, we are taking action to do just that,” said Pompeo in a press briefing according to a report by ANI.

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Pompeo also said that the Communist party was stepping efforts to undermine Hong Kong’s ‘high degree of autonomy’.“Beijing’s continued actions undermine its commitment and obligations to the Sino- British Joint Declaration to respect Hong Kong's high degree of autonomy. At the same time Beijing continues to undermine human rights and fundamental freedoms in Hong Kong by putting pressure on local authorities to arrest pro-democracy activists and disqualify pro-democracy electoral candidates,” said Pompeo in the report.

He went on to declare the restriction on ‘current and former communist party officials’ who are complicit in undermining Hong Kong’s autonomy. China has criticized this move and has said in a statement that ‘Hong Kong affairs are China's domestic affairs that allow no external interference’. It also said that the US should immediately correct its mistake and withdraw the decision.

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In a swift move, the Beijing government has imposed a National Security Law on Hong Kong which will go into effect from July even though the bill was introduced just a month ago. The draft legislation would outlaw acts of secession, subversion and terrorism and to "prevent, frustrate and punish" threats to national security in Hong Kong. Citizens of the fear that this will have an impact on their independent judicial system and their civil freedom. The talks over a national security bill have been going on since 1997 and in 2003 when the Chinese government attempted to impose the Bill it faced a massive backlash. In 2019, there were widespread protests in Hong Kong over another bill that was introduced by China in which suspects in Hong Kong can be extradited to the Chinese mainland.

The rift between the US and China is growing ever since the pandemic outbreak. The US has been critical of the way China has handled the crisis and over a period of months has introduced several restrictions on China.