appConfigEntityId

bodyType

customContents

entityId

entityUuid

isVideo

articlePageQuery

article

articleSchemaContent

content

hooksArticlePageAdvertisementConfigArticle

hooksArticlePageFloatingButtonConfigArticle

appConfig

filter

json

liveArticle

Letters

Feel strongly about these letters, or any other aspects of the news? Share your views by emailing us your Letter to the Editor at letters@scmp.com or filling in this Google form. Submissions should not exceed 400 words.
There is a security guard at the entrance of my housing estate. He has worked there for more than a decade, knows every resident by sight and remembers when each child finishes school and which elderly resident takes evening walks.
During the Covid-19 pandemic, he had one more task: reminding everyone entering the lobby to check their temperature. No one ever found him annoying. Everyone understood he was simply doing his job, and that job allowed the entire building to sleep soundly.
Curiously, no one has ever suggested, “There has been no break-in for five years, so let’s fire security.” No one has proposed, “CCTV is a waste of electricity, let’s remove it.” On the contrary, the more upscale the building, the more sophisticated its security systems: double-access gates, floor-specific lift cards, 24-hour guards and full CCTV coverage. Residents in such buildings do not complain that there are too many security measures – they only worry they are not professional enough.
The same logic should apply to the security of our city. What happened in 2019 was like someone storming into our lobby, smashing things and creating chaos. Now the protests have stopped, door locks have been installed and guards put in place. That does not mean the locks can be removed.
Risks don’t disappear; they evolve. Just as estate security knows burglars do not only enter through the main entrance but also through the car park and back staircases, Hong Kong must secure not only its streets but also its cyberspace, schools, media and legal system.
A functioning lock proves its value not by being picked every day but by deterring anyone from trying. The deterrent effect of national security legislation lies in the fact that it does not need to be frequently invoked.
Our guard is getting older and will soon retire, but I know his replacement will undergo the same training and work the same shifts. Peaceful days have never fallen from the sky. They have always had to be guarded.
If this is true for our estate, it is no less true for Hong Kong as a whole. The lock cannot be removed.
Dr Chen Xiaoxin, president, Policy Research Committee, Hong Kong Quality and Talent Migrants Association
China-Nepal early-warning mechanism needed
Your report, “China-Nepal border disaster: 1,000-plus missing as Beijing sends rescue teams” (August 27), describes two rescue operations. That is precisely the difficulty: two states mobilising separately on opposite sides of a valley that the water treats as continuous.
The reflex is to read this as an upstream-downstream problem, the hazard forming in one country and landing in another. The figures dispel that. The Chinese side reported more than 550 people missing. This is not a case of competing interests requiring a negotiated bargain. It is a case of two governments with an identical interest and no channel to act on it.
The lakes above this border, supraglacial and moraine-dammed, are already observed by satellite. What does not exist is an agreed threshold at which an observation on one side triggers an automatic alert on the other, through a technical contact point operating below the diplomatic level, so that a warning does not need a ministry’s signature to cross a border.
Treaties on Himalayan rivers concern themselves with water rights and allocation, but not always hazard information. The gap is now measurable in the missing.
Dr Zaheer Allam, College of Architecture, Art and Design, American University of Sharjah
Hold AI camps for youth
The United Kingdom is providing “AI boot camps” to youth who are out of work or at risk of unemployment. The number of young Britons neither working nor learning reached 1.01 million in the first quarter.
An International Labour Organization report showed global youth unemployment reaching 12.4 per cent last year, equivalent to 67 million unemployed people aged 15 to 24.
More artificial intelligence boot camps should be created for young people, so they can learn to build AI tools, understand how businesses use AI and use the technology responsibly. Addressing the issue is in the interest of affected youth as well as the community.
Lau Wing-sze, Tseung Kwan O


Hong Kong hits out at US panel over Jimmy Lai hearing and sanctions bill

Hong Kong 999 callers can send real-time audio, video data from 2028: Chris Tang

Beijing’s ‘trust issue’ with Hong Kong and what the city can promise in its 5-year plan

No ‘red line’ for approving assemblies but security threats remain: police chief

Hong Kong national security law (NSL)

Don’t take peaceful days in Hong Kong as a given

People pass by wanted warrants for overseas activists at Shenzhen Bay border crossing on June 17. Photo: Jelly Tse

Fix Hong Kong’s healthcare silos with link workers

Sham Shui Po District Health Centre in 2022. Photo: Jelly Tse


Hong Kong should study the mainland gig worker insurance model

A food delivery rider in Mong Kok in 2025. When Deliveroo exited the Hong Kong market, many delivery workers were left without compensation. Photo: Sam Tsang

Why Hong Kong needs special courts for drug offenders

A sparrow flies near the statue of Themis, the blindfolded goddess of justice, on the roof of the Court of Final Appeal building in Central. Photo: Jelly Tse

Opinion

Readers discuss the security of the city, a China-Nepal early-warning mechanism, and AI boot camps


Readers discuss the security of the city, a China-Nepal early-warning mechanism, and AI boot camps.


.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Readers discuss the security of the city, a China-Nepal early-warning mechanism, and AI boot camps

Readers discuss the security of the city, a China-Nepal early-warning mechanism, and AI boot camps