HONG KONG -- Hong Kong has been omitted from an influential index that ranks the freedom of the world's economies because of Beijing's tightening control over the territory, an embarrassing exclusion for a city that topped the list for a quarter century and whose government routinely touted its open economic policies.
The Heritage Foundation said its annual "Index of Economic Freedom," issued on Thursday, no longer included Hong Kong and Macao because it "measures economic freedom only in independent countries where governments exercise sovereign control of economic policies."
