No, the distinction is key in your "One may claim they're just complying with the law of the land". This basic difference between respecting the law and succumbing to autocrat's lawlessness is the entire basis for the apology. Ie. we don't collude with criminal dictators, we are following legal code like we do in the west. (Like there is a law that citizen data must be hosted in country so we have Chinese icloud now or we remove Taiwan flag emoji because it is not recognized.)

And my point was that there is no such law in this case. Apple cannot excuse itself with it. Developers who implemented this feature must consider what they are doing and in the name of what.