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Re:Hong Kong leader to announce formal withdrawal of extradi... by 188201 on Wednesday September 04, 2019 @09:57AM (#20877231)
The real reason for their backdown is that Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act in US will be likely to pass. This bill will punish HK official for violating human right. And potentially forbidden the use of financial services like Visa and Mastercard.

However, it's not even a real backdown though. She just announce to start a motion to backdown, but it was still the decision of parliament to withdraw the bill, and the parliament was controlled by pro-Beijing parties. Practically even pro-Beijing parties care the voter's view so it may withdraw the bill, but it was uncertain whether there were an order from Beijing to vote down withdrawal after the protest was over, so still many uncertainty right here. Not to mention police brutality was not addressed.

Re:Hong Kong leader to announce formal withdrawal of extradi... by _hardwaregeek on Wednesday September 04, 2019 @03:05PM (#20880368)
Forbidding VISA and Mastercard doesn’t sound like a good idea. Wouldn’t that lead to people using WeChat/AliPay which is controlled by the Chinese government?
Re:Hong Kong leader to announce formal withdrawal of extradi... by SllX on Wednesday September 04, 2019 @03:14PM (#20880457)
It’s been an effective method of sanctioning individuals and organizations so far. WeChat and Alipay isn’t worth a damn outside of PRC, and sanctioning a handful of pro-Beijing individuals isn’t likely to change that. Truth is, the United States still dominates the global financial infrastructure and being cut off from that is a difficult pill for most to swallow.
Re:Hong Kong leader to announce formal withdrawal of extradi... by _hardwaregeek on Wednesday September 04, 2019 @03:36PM (#20880655)
I guess. But what would the average citizen use? Cash? Seems likely that somebody would step in to be the de facto online transaction provider. And the government probably would want some way to financially tie HK to the mainland.
Re:Hong Kong leader to announce formal withdrawal of extradi... by SllX on Wednesday September 04, 2019 @07:17PM (#20882332)
I think you are misunderstanding. These sorts of sanctions are highly targeted at specific individuals and organizations, not the entire HK citizenry.
Re:Hong Kong leader to announce formal withdrawal of extradi... by _hardwaregeek on Wednesday September 04, 2019 @08:37PM (#20882824)
Ah okay, yeah. I misunderstood. Thanks for clarifying!