The Chinese Cooperative Council was a civilian council consisting of leading local Chinese and Eurasians leaders during the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong. After the British surrender, the Japanese tried to consolidate their power by collaborating with the local Chinese leaders. In January 1942, few weeks after the British surrender, Lieutenant General Takashi Sakai invited about 130 leading Chinese and Eurasian leaders in Hong Kong to a formal luncheon set at the Peninsula Hotel in Kowloon. In the meeting, Saikai elaborated the idea of the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere where the Chinese and Japanese should cooperate with each other. After Sakai was replaced by Lieutenant General Isogai Rensuke in late January 1942, two councils, the Chinese Representative Council and the Chinese Cooperative Council were established, replacing the Rehabilitation Advisory Committee on 30 March 1942; the Chinese Cooperative Council was chaired by Chow Shouson, member of the Executive Council and Legislative Council of the British Hong Kong government before the war.

The 22 members of the council were selected by the three-member Chinese Representative Council which chaired by Lo Kuk-wo. The Chinese Cooperative Council was directly responsible to the Japanese governor, its duties were to report to the governor complaints from the population, to convey decisions and policies of the government and to advise the government on matters concerning the population. Although the council met twice a week to discuss issues, it had limited power. All the council could do was to try to persuade the government to accept it, it headed the District Affairs Bureaux Councils and the wards which were staffed by Chinese

Mabel Lee Hankey, née Mabel Emily Hobson, was a British artist specialising in miniature portraits painted in watercolour on ivory. Hankey was born Mabel Emily Hobson, the fourth child of the artists Henry Edrington Hobson and Ada Vinson Hardy, she was part of the third generation of artists in the family: both her grandfathers, Henry Hobson and James Hardy, were artists. Mabel's siblings were employed as artists: Henry Hope Hobson as a draftsman, Amy Elizabeth Hobson as a portrait painter, Cecil James Hobson as a painter of miniature portraits in watercolor on ivory. In 1896 Hobson married William Lee Hankey, an artist who worked on book illustrations, character studies and pastoral scenes. After changing her name to Mabel Lee Hankey, she was listed variously under Lee Hankey, Lee-Hankey, or Hankey in catalogues; the marriage ended in divorce after 21 years, thereafter Hankey used the name Mabel Emily Hankey. Hankey exhibited at the Royal Academy and the Royal Miniature Society from 1889 to 1897 under her maiden name, again from 1898-1914 under the name Mabel Lee Hankey.

Hankey painted for aristocratic families but is best known for her portraits of Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon. In 1907, Lady Cecilia Bowes-Lyon, Countess of Strathmore and Kinghorne commissioned a watercolour miniature portrait of her daughter, Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother, which Hankey exhibited at the Royal Academy and is now in the Royal Collection. Hankey went on to paint Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon a number of times from childhood to adulthood and her brother, David Bowes-Lyon, in 1916. Most Lady Strathmore commissioned a miniature portrait in 1917, framed in gold and silver set with sapphires with a jeweled crown at the top; the portrait was a wedding gift to Prince Albert, Duke of York on his marriage to Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon. Princess Elizabeth, painted 1942 Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon Princess Mary Princess Royal & Countess of Harewood painted 1910-14 H. M. Queen Elizabeth, The Queen Mother, when Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, painted 1907 Rachel Kay-Shuttleworth, painted 1905 Lady Cornelia Henrietta Maria Spencer-Churchill, painted 1905 Alice Frances Theodora Wythes, Marchioness of Bristol, painted 1903 Lady Violet Ida Evelyn Lane-Fox, 16th Baroness Darcy of Nayth, Countess of Powis, painted 1885-1890 Edwin Fagg Esq Summer Days Miniatures by Hankey in the Royal Collection