Exclusive | Hong Kong Bar Association to go on ‘ice-breaking’ trip to Beijing after being frozen out for 5 years
- Chairman Victor Dawes reveals Beijing’s chief of Hong Kong affairs asked him for a meeting in Shenzhen to discuss concerns of the city’s legal fraternity, including the future of common law system
- Regular exchanges with mainland authorities to resume after five years of suspension
The Hong Kong Bar Association will lead a 20-member delegation to the country’s capital in April in a significant thawing of relations after such exchanges were frozen five years ago and amid assurances from Beijing that the city’s common law system will remain unchanged.
In an exclusive interview with the Post on Wednesday, association chairman Victor Dawes, SC, also revealed that Xia Baolong, director of the State Council’s Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office (HKMAO), had sent out a reassuring message in a private meeting with him that the city’s independent bar would remain a vital part of the common law system which in itself was critical to Hong Kong.
“At the meeting with Xia, I raised the concern of some young barristers that there is no independent barristers profession in mainland China and whether the independent bar in Hong Kong will disappear in the future,” Dawes said.
“I was then assured by him that he saw the independent bar as part of the common law system in Hong Kong and there is no reason to change our system.”
Ahead of the ice-breaking visit to Beijing, he revealed the association had also started to resume regular activities with the mainland with some members recommencing in-person teaching classes about the common law system in Peking University this month.
Describing the visit as “meeting old friends and making new friends”, Dawes said he was informed by Beijing authorities some time ago that the association could make the 20-member delegation visit from April 11 to 15 to Beijing.
