Proposal to hand over fugitives to mainland China, Taiwan and Macau is necessary, says Hong Kong justice minister Teresa Cheng
- Teresa Cheng told reporters that the Security Bureau’s plan was needed to plug legal loopholes and ensure justice is seen to be done
- Top US envoy warned that a move to extradite fugitives to mainland could hurt bilateral legal arrangements between Hong Kong and US if details are not right
The city’s justice chief said on Tuesday the government’s proposal to hand over fugitives to mainland China, Taiwan and Macau was necessary to plug legal loopholes.
Speaking for the first time since the Security Bureau revealed the plan two weeks ago, Teresa Cheng Yeuk-wah said the proposed plan would prevent suspects from using the city as a haven to evade justice.
“[The new law] allows us to instigate related procedures as early as possible to hand over suspects to other jurisdictions. Overall, it is a good thing,” Cheng told reporters at Hong Kong International Airport after a two-day trip to Beijing, where she met the vice-presidents of the Supreme People’s Court. “Justice would be seen to be done.”
During the visit, Cheng also met the director general of the Department of Treaty and Law of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to discuss matters related to dispute resolution services in the “Greater Bay Area” and Belt and Road-related regions.
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The United States’ top envoy to Hong Kong warned that the proposed changes to the law could hurt bilateral arrangements for legal assistance between the city and the US if the wording of the law was not right.
In a TVB interview on Tuesday, US Consul General Kurt Tong stressed that “the details in this kind of thing really matter”.
“There is a possibility that if it is structured in certain ways, then that could have some impact on the implementation of our bilateral arrangement between the US and Hong Kong,” said Tong, who was quick to add: “But I don’t want to prejudge that.”
Hong Kong and the US signed an agreement on mutual legal assistance in criminal matters in 2000.
Huang Ting-hui, who is tasked with handling affairs concerning Hong Kong, Macau, Inner Mongolia and Tibet at the Mainland Affairs Council, also stressed that any act aimed at “destroying the national sovereignty” of the self-governing island would not be deemed acceptable.
Pro-democracy lawmakers in Hong Kong have also opposed the plan in light of the mainland’s human rights record, but the security minister John Lee Ka-chiu stressed the proposal was about securing justice.
On February 12, the Security Bureau revealed its plan to tweak the law to allow the surrender of fugitives to any jurisdiction the city does not have an extradition deal with, including Macau, Taiwan and the mainland.
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Under the proposal, extradition requests would be handled on a case-by-case basis, with the city’s chief executive issuing a certificate to start the transfer of a fugitive. The final say on granting the arrest and eventual transfer would remain with the courts.
The Hong Kong government said the change is aimed at plugging loopholes exposed by a homicide case in February last year in which Taiwanese authorities were unable to prosecute a Hongkonger accused of killing his pregnant girlfriend in Taipei before fleeing to Hong Kong.
Taiwan’s request for his surrender to stand trial on murder charges could not be processed in the absence of a formal extradition arrangement between the two jurisdictions.