Beijing's planned national security legislation for Hong Kong is set to block its foreign judges from handling national security trials, people familiar with the matter said, which would exacerbate concerns about the city's judicial independence.
BEIJING - Beijing’s planned national security legislation for Hong Kong is set to block its foreign judges from handling national security trials, people familiar with the matter said, which would exacerbate concerns about the city’s judicial independence.
The people familiar with the issue declined to be identified because they are not authorised to speak to the media.The Legislative Affairs Commission of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress could not immediately be reached for comment. China’s Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Hong Kong’s foreign judges stem from an arrangement established at its 1997 handover to help maintain its credibility as an international financial hub. The Hong Kong Bar Association said China’s plan to impose the law without public consultation or local legislative scrutiny had caused “deep unease in the local and international community”.Hong Kong’s mini-constitution, known as the Basic Law, enshrines the independence of the judiciary and states that judges may come from other common law jurisdictions.
Another Hong Kong delegate to the largely rubber-stamp NPC, Maggie Chan, proposed a National Security Court where cases could only be heard by Chinese judges, Hong Kong media cited her as saying on the sidelines of the NPC.The new legislation is also expected to enable Beijing to establish intelligence agencies in Hong Kong. Mainland security and intelligence services now have no enforcement powers in the city.
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