In June 2020, on the eve of the anniversary of the Tiananmen Square protests, HSBC took the rare step of wading into political issues by publicly backing Beijing's controversial new national security law for Hong Kong.[171] The chief executive for HSBC's Asia-Pacific division, Peter Wong, signed a petition supporting the law and stated in a post on Chinese social media that HSBC "respects and supports all laws that stabilise Hong Kong's social order."[172][173]