Violence in Hong Kong Legislative Council chamber on rise, top prosecutor reports
Senior justice department official describes division’s work last year as ‘most challenging’
Hong Kong’s outgoing director of public prosecutions has described his division’s work last year as “most challenging,” citing “a disturbing surge” in public order cases involving violence both “inside and outside” the city’s legislature.
In presenting the annual report, Keith Yeung Ka-hung pledged his staff would remain impartial, independent, and “apolitical” in handling cases.
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It was Yeung’s fourth and last report to Secretary for Justice Rimsky Yuen Kwok-keung. Yeung is stepping down on Friday when his term expires.
In the report’s introduction, Yeung wrote that the prosecutions division had gone through “a most challenging” year in 2016.
“A good number of [cases], because of their nature ... or of the parties involved ... or both, firmly gripped the public’s attention and imagination. Open scrutiny was at an all-time high. At certain stages, some cases got covered sentence by sentence, question by question.
