John Lee Ka-chiu

"No country will allow its legislative structure, parliament or congress to be filled up by treasonists, foreign agents or proxies of foreign forces. The Hong Kong electoral system must therefore be protected from exploitation and from foreign interference."

"I must point out to you that the democratic process of Hong Kong started after China resumed exercising sovereignty. No country has monopoly on the model of democracy."

"One unfortunate fact is that Hong Kong itself has failed to close a loophole in its system which left its door open to national security threats. Despite having reunified with our mother country for over 23 years, Hong Kong has failed to carry out its obligation under the Basic Law Article 23 to legislate to protect national security. This has created a vacuum. Certain external forces have exploited this vacuum to further their political gains at the expense of our national security and Hong Kong's interests."

"In Hong Kong, no person is above the law regardless of status, wealth, political power or background. The National Security Law is applied fairly. Enforcement actions and trials are based on facts and evidence. Judgments are made public with elaborate reasoning on decisions."

"If there is no attack on police, if there is no use of violence, of course there is no need for police to resort to the use of force. You can see petrol bombs being thrown, you can see fire being set, you can see people being dragged out of the car because of opposite views. So, this is sowing the sea of terror which I think police must deal with."

"Housing is the key to solve different issues, including poverty and youth development."

"We are the access to the mainland market. These are the strengths that will not be replaced by any cities in China or any countries in the world."

"The violent riots that had taken place in Hong Kong since June 2019… had the more profound consequences of ruining people’s law-abidingness and breeding homegrown terrorism."

"[I]f anyone tries to challenge the Hong Kong National Security Law… it is tantamount to playing with fire and [they] will pay a heavy price…"

"Safeguarding national security is only natural. The US wants to use those so-called sanctions to intimidate [me] – it will not succeed."

"If you are genuinely interested in press freedom, you should support actions against people who have unlawfully exploited the media as a tool to pursue their political or personal gains."

"Hong Kong has experienced mobility of people over its history, especially in the last 25 years. This is a thing that we have been living with and coming across regularly."