All Around Town | Is this what Beijing means by a ‘transparent’ judicial system?
Mainland China has a camera in every court to keep tabs on judges, CPPCC member reveals
China recently found a novel way to “impress” judges around the world with its judicial system: by surveilling all courts in the country, according to a senior member of the nation’s top advisory body.
Ambrose Lau Hon-chuen, a Standing Committee member of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, told journalists that China’s top judge Zhou Qiang recently told him that they were now able to monitor any hearing in the country.
“Zhou just needs to press a button and he can see any hearing in thousands of courts in China live,” Lau revealed.
“That was to improve the transparency of China’s judicial system … if any judge acts in an unjust way, Beijing would know. Zhou said even foreign judges who visited China were impressed with it.”
Lau, a former president of the Law Society, stopped short of saying whether there was anything for Hong Kong to learn from this, but it was understood that the city’s independent judiciary would not become as “transparent” as China’s, as photography is strictly prohibited in the city’s courts.