Michael Bociurkiw is a global affairs analyst and a former reporter for the South China Sunday Morning Post and Eastern Express (HK). The opinions expressed in this commentary are his; view more opinions on CNN.

(CNN) When the last British governor of Hong Kong sailed out of Victoria Harbor on July 1,1997, many expected the Chinese government to honor pledges to maintain the colony's basic freedoms, enshrined in the so-called Basic Law -- in effect, the territory's mini-Constitution.

After all, the thinking went, Beijing would have nothing to gain by tinkering with the rule of law in one of the world's premier trade and business hubs. It wouldn't dare pluck the feathers of what had traditionally been known as the goose that lays China's golden eggs -- a freewheeling, capitalist enclave that served as China's gateway to the world for trade and investment. And freedom of the press would be tolerated on the assumption that the Chinese understood the need for business to have unfettered access to information.

Michael Bociurkiw

Moreover, the British had installed a world class legal and physical infrastructure that was expected to endure far into the future. That included such institutional safeguards as the powerful and feared Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC), designed to keep the noses of the civil service squeaky clean.

But almost half way into the mandate of the "one country, two systems" experiment, Beijing appears to be accelerating Hong Kong's absorption into China at a pace no British foreign office official might have expected in the heady run-up to the handover.

That includes a hard crackdown on dissent, especially on anyone who advocates independence of Hong Kong from the mainland. The situation was brought into focus Monday when three of the territory's most high-profile pro-democracy protesters appeared in court on charges of fomenting unrest during 2014 street protests that brought the central business district to a standstill for almost three months. (They have pleaded not guilty but face up to seven years in prison if convicted.)

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