5,000 citizens of Hong Kong apply for UK visas

NEARLY 5,000 Hong Kong citizens have applied to live, work and study in the UK under a new visa scheme.

The British National Overseas passport-holders have taken up an offer made by the government in response to a security crackdown by China that threatens freedoms.

They will be allowed to live in the UK for five years, then apply for ‘settled status’ and citizenship.

Around half of applicants are Hongkongers already living in the UK, according to The Times.

Up to 5.4million citizens of the ex-British colony may be eligible.

SIR ELTON JOHN has hailed It’s A Sin as one of the best television shows he has ever seen.

He admitted that, having lived through the Aids crisis himself, he ‘didn’t care what I got up to’ as a young man.

Elton was talking to Years & Years frontman Olly Alexander, 30,

(below, right) who plays aspiring actor

Ritchie in the hit

Channel 4 drama set in the 1980s.

The music legend confessed: ‘It reminded me of myself in the 1970s. I was a very naughty boy and I had so much fun and I didn’t care what I got up to.’ Elton, 73, who married Renate Blauel in 1984, added: ‘I have to say, being a gay man and having lived through that time, this is probably one of the best things I’ve ever seen on television, ever!’ Speaking on his Rocket Hour show for Apple Music, Elton also reminisced about his friend Freddie Mercury, who died from Aids in 1991.

‘I was at the funeral and it was one of the most upsetting occasions of my life,’ he said.

‘It was a surreal experience. I miss him every day.’