Hong Kong pro-democracy group travels to Taiwan to discuss fugitive extradition proposal, risking wrath from Beijing
- Veteran lawmaker says there are ‘worries some Taiwanese would be extradited to mainland China through Hong Kong’
- Move comes after official says Taipei won’t sign any deal that implies Taiwan is part of China
Pro-democracy politicians and activists who oppose a Hong Kong government proposal for a fugitive extradition agreement with mainland China, Taiwan and Macau have taken their campaign to Taipei in a move bound to provoke Beijing.
Members of the group began to arrive on Tuesday, after a Taiwanese official said the government would not sign any extradition deal with Hong Kong that would have implications for the one-China principle, under which both Beijing and Taipei claim to be the legitimate government of China.
The Security Bureau had argued the amendment was designed to plug legal loopholes exposed last year when Taiwanese authorities were unable to extradite a Hongkonger accused of killing his pregnant girlfriend in Taipei before fleeing back home.
The new extradition proposal – slammed by the pan-democrats as a security threat to everyone in the city – would allow the reciprocal transfer of fugitives to jurisdictions where Hong Kong lacks an extradition treaty, including Macau, Taiwan and mainland China, on a case-by-case basis.
“We know there are worries some Taiwanese would be extradited to the mainland through Hong Kong,” said James To Kun-sun, a Democratic Party veteran who in 1997 chaired the committee on the Fugitive Offenders Bill, which the government now seeks to amend.