Paul Harris, the former chairman of the Hong Kong Bar Association, has met national security police to assist with an investigation, the Post has learned. The senior counsel arrived at police headquarters in Wan Chai at about 11am on Tuesday and was accompanied by two men. A police source said Harris went to the headquarters by appointment and gave a statement under caution to the National Security Department. “He was here to assist with an investigation handled by the National Security Department. No arrests were made,” said the source, who refused to go into details of the case. Hong Kong Bar chief Paul Harris ‘pulled’ from national security trial During the interview, Harris was asked to explain acts that had allegedly violated the national security law, the Post learned. Asked whether Harris had attended an interview with national security officers, a police spokesman said in a written reply: “In conducting any operation, police act on the basis of actual circumstances and according to the law. Police do not comment on individual cases.” The veteran human rights lawyer left the headquarters shortly after 1.30pm and did not respond to reporters’ questions. He was elected unopposed in January 2021 as the association’s new chairman, succeeding Philip Dykes, who was in the role for three years. Harris, who stayed in the post for a year, wanted the government to amend the sweeping national security law , imposed by Beijing in June 2020, to convince countries to reinstate their extradition agreements with the city. He also expressed concern that some of the provisions of the legislation appeared at odds with rights guaranteed under the Basic Law , the city’s mini-constitution. Soon after he took over at the association, Beijing’s two top agencies overseeing Hong Kong affairs lashed out and described Harris as an anti-Communist lawyer who had challenged national sovereignty and the bottom line of the “one country, two systems” principle. National security police request information on Confederation of Trade Unions Three months later, Beijing’s liaison office in Hong Kong ratcheted up its attack on the then Bar Association chairman, denouncing Harris as an “anti-China politician” whose continuing tenure it warned would make a mockery of the legal body. “How could such an anti-China politician as Paul Harris who has close connections with foreign countries fulfil the principles of safeguarding Hong Kong’s rule of law and the Basic Law and support the one country, two systems principle as previously stated by the Bar Association?” a spokesman said then. “It makes a mockery of the Bar Association by condoning Paul Harris to continue chairing the group.” The strongly worded statement targeted Harris’ remarks defending the right to peaceful protests after 10 people, including newspaper mogul Jimmy Lai Chee-ying, were convicted of their roles in illegal assemblies on August 18 and 31 in 2019. The Bar Association, founded in 1949, is the professional organisation for barristers in Hong Kong and is registered under the Societies Ordinance. Its objectives are generally to consider and take proper action on all matters affecting the legal profession and the administration of justice.