Criminal lawyer Edwin Choy opens up on resignation from Hong Kong Bar Association, saying his outlook on protest violence diverged too much from others
- Many protesters ‘have been stirred into abandoning reason and replacing it with barbarism’, says Edwin Choy, who represented Occupy leaders
- Destructive acts serve ‘no meaningful purpose’, while Hong Kong is ‘engulfed in the flames of senseless nihilism’, he says.
A top criminal lawyer has said he resigned as the vice-chairman of the Hong Kong Bar Association over its failure to condemn protesters’ violent acts during the ongoing anti-government demonstrations.
“As it became increasingly apparent to me that a substantial majority of my colleagues on the Bar Council remained highly reticent to state, with unequivocal clarity, that both the rioters and those who proffer excuses on their behalf should be condemned, I was convinced that my outlook diverged too much from [that of] the council for me to remain among its ranks,” he said.
A legal source told the Post that while the association had issued three statements to denounce protesters in the past months, Choy wanted one more but did not get enough support.