Britain was leasing Hong Kong, they didn’t own it. They were in no position to demand anything from China.
“Britain was leasing Hong Kong, they didn’t own it. They were in no position to demand anything from China.”
Actually no. Hong Kong itself was ceded to Britain in perpetuity after the 1st & 2nd Opium Wars.
But then Britain extended the colony to the “new territories”. The new territories are/were very much larger than Hong Kong proper. It is that part of Hong Kong on which there was a 99 year lease. It is that lease that was up in 1997.
But, by that time, Britain saw no way to separate Hong Kong proper (the city) from the rest of the crown colony of Hong Kong. THAT is why the ceded Hong Kong proper, along with the “new territories” when the lease on the new territories was up.
The political reality is that through all the 100 years as a British colony with a British governor, the British form of government became part of the culture, the political culture of Hong Kong, the culture under which generations of Hong Kong citizens were born and raised and educated. By the end of the colonial period there was a representative legislature.
The people of mainland China today never had those opportunities in any equal sense. They have come of age, been educated and operated under a dictatorship and most have known nothing else.
When the Hong Kong protestors are protesting they are protesting the less of a reality they know, NO MATTER HOW THAT HAPPENED. To them it is not about the British and the former emperors of China. It is about their lives today.