Committee for Safeguarding National Security

The Committee for Safeguarding National Security of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region is a national security committee established by the Government of Hong Kong under the Article 12 of the Hong Kong national security law. The committee is supervised and accountable to the Central People's Government of China.

The committee is chaired by the Chief Executive, as stated in the Article 13 of the law. The committee's other members are the Chief Secretary for Administration, the Financial Secretary, the Secretary for Justice, the Secretary for Security, the Commissioner of Police, the head of the department for safeguarding national security of the Hong Kong Police Force, the Director of Immigration, the Commissioner of Customs and Excise, and the Director of the Chief Executive's Office.

On 2 July 2020, Eric Chan was appointed as secretary-general of the committee.

On 3 July 2020, a Hong Kong government spokesperson stated that the Committee for Safeguarding National Security of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region was formally established with Carrie Lam as chairwoman and Eric Chan as secretary-general. The other members are Matthew Cheung Kin-chung (Chief Secretary for Administration), Paul Chan Mo-po (Financial Secretary), Teresa Cheng (Secretary for Justice), John Lee Ka-chiu (Secretary for Security), Chris Tang (Commissioner of Hong Kong Police Force), Edwina Lau Chi-wai (Deputy Commissioner of Hong Kong Police Force and the head of the Department for safeguarding national security of the Hong Kong Police Force), Au Ka-wang (Director of Immigration), and Hermes Tang Yi-hoi (Commissioner of Customs and Excise). Also on 3 July 2020, Luo Huining, the director of the Liaison Office was appointed by the State Council to the role of the committee's National Security Adviser. The creation of this post is stipulated by Article 15 of the national security law. The Australian Strategic Policy Institute opined that the post now appeared to be the most powerful position in Hong Kong.

The committee convened its first meeting on 6 July 2020.

Carrie Lam, Eric Chan, Teresa Cheng, John Lee, Chris Tang, and Luo Huining were among those sanctioned by the United States Treasury in August 2020 pursuant to the Normalization Executive Order (Executive Order 13936). The order had been issued by US President Donald Trump on 14 July in response to the imposition of the national security law. Edwina Lau was sanctioned by the US on 9 November as one of four more officials.

In January 2023, the committee said that the law in Hong Kong should be changed to ban overseas lawyers from national security cases. This came after Jimmy Lai had attempted to hire Tim Owen as his lawyer, and a subsequent approval in December 2022 by the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress of an interpretation – not in relation to a Lai's case – that the chief executive and the committee had the final say in whether overseas lawyers could be admitted in national security cases.

According to the Hong Kong national security law, the Committee comprises the following ex-officio members: