The British government’s decision to amend its extradition treaty with Hong Kong has been greeted with shock and confusion among the many activists hiding in the UK to escape prosecution in Hong Kong.
Whitehall announced last week that it was going to scrap Hong Kong off its extradition list and in future handle all extradition applications on a case-by-case basis. The Home Office said it was amending legislation to enable co-operation between the UK and Hong Kong on matters of extradition. The UK signed an extradition treaty with Hong Kong in 1997, but it was suspended in 2020 after mass demonstrations forced the Hong Kong SAR Government to withdraw a bill that would allow extradition between Hong Kong and Taiwan, Macau and the Chinese mainland.
There was an immediate reaction to the Home Office announcement from Hong Kong activists and politicians in the UK, calling the proposal a betrayal. They could see their safe haven eroding away and even abandonment by their saviours. The so-called pro-democracy group, Hong Kong Watch said the plan was a “reckless move which will endanger many pro-democracy activists now living in the UK.”
The UK’s Home Office minister Dan Jarvis reckons some 160,000 Hong Kongers have emigrated to the UK since 2021. However, it is believed that many are having assimilation problems, finding work at levels they are accustomed to and higher taxation.
Jarvis defends the new proposed legislation saying it is merely a necessary legal step to allow the “severing of ties.” He wrote to parliamentarians earlier mentioning that even if there were strong reasons for the extradition of fugitives to Hong Kong, the current regulations would not allow this to be done, and it was necessary to make amendments to allow the UK side to cooperate with these non-treaty partners on a case-by-case basis.
The shadow minister for national security Alicia Kearns, in a letter riddled with untruths and false information to Jarvis, claimed that “many Hongkongers arrested for protest were given false violent convictions as a method of opposing dissent …” and that “protections should be put in place to identify and reject false charges made against the activists”.
Kearns should know better. The charges against the renegade activists are real and of a criminal nature. They are fleeing prosecution and trial by a common law court similar to the UK and recognized as one of the fairest in the world. Kearns is effectively harbouring criminals fleeing justice.
Since the handover in 1997 Hong Kong has signed up extradition treaties with 17 countries of which eight, including Australia, UK, US and New Zealand, suspended the agreement after Hong Kong introduced its new national security laws.
Missing from that round of agreements were Taiwan, Macau and the Chinese mainland.
There was no hurry until early 2018 when 19-year-old Hong Kong resident Chan Tong-kai murdered his pregnant girlfriend in Taiwan, then returned to Hong Kong where he admitted to police that he had killed his girlfriend. But the police were unable to charge him for murder or extradite him to Taiwan because no agreement was in place at the time. Hong Kong Legislators felt the loophole had to be fixed and introduced the Extradition 2019 bill.
Anti-China propogandists seized the opportunity and quickly spread rumours that anyone committing a crime in Hong Kong could be tried in China. Poppycock! Let logic prevail. First, the two places have different legal systems: Hong Kong enjoys the Common Law system practiced in all British commonwealth countries and the US while China practices the civil law system practiced in the rest of the world. [In civil law jurisdictions, courts base their decisions on the interpretation and application of statutes and codes. Judges have a more limited role in shaping the law compared to their counterparts in common law jurisdictions. In common law jurisdictions, judges play a vital role in shaping the law through their interpretation of legal precedents.] The bill was to facilitate the extradition of a person who commits a crime and flees to another country to be returned to the country where the offence took place to stand trial. But the seeds of doubt had been sown, and masses of demonstrators took to the streets demanding that the proposal be dropped. They won.
At the time the bill was introduced, it was estimated there were some 300 fugitives from the mainland living in Hong Kong without fear of being returned to the mainland for trial.
In the UK there can be no doubt that the subject will be widely debated in the Commons and the House of Lords where politicians have already picked sides, thanks to the lobbying efforts by anti-Hong Kong/China groups.
Mark Pinkstone
** The blog article is the sole responsibility of the author and does not represent the position of our company. **
As Hong Kong has been developing in leaps and bounds, so has its medical services increased to meet local demands.
And with planned new hospitals in the Northern Metropolis along with current expansion and construction development, expertise is expected to increase and the dreaded waiting times for patients will be considerably reduced.
Hong Kong is poised to be the medical centre of Asia.
Currently, Hong Kong has about 36,000 beds in 43 public hospitals and 14 private hospitals. And already they are overcrowded, aided undoubtedly by an increasing aging population. Patients have to wait up to two hours for a consultation in public hospitals and up to a year or more for onward specialised bookings for appointment.
But that is about to change. Opening on December 11 in Tseung Kwan O will be the 400-bed Chinese Medicine Hospital of Hong Kong run by the Baptist University under the umbrella of the Health Bureau of the government and not to be confused with the Hospital Authority which runs all public hospitals and clinics in Hong Kong.
This is a major breakthrough for Chinese medicine (CM) to be fully integrated with research into western-Chinese medicines while serving the community. It will be the flagship for the 18 Chinese medicine clinics already operating in all districts in Hong Kong.
In its first year of operation, it will provide only outpatient 25 beds and day-patient services and six specialised CM services – internal medicine, external medicine, gynaecology, paediatrics, orthopaedics and traumatology, and acupuncture and moxibustion. It will also provide 12 special disease programs including those for elderly degenerative diseases and stroke rehabilitation.
Inpatient services will start from late next year, with other services expanding year by year, including the remaining 11 special disease programs. It is expected that by the end of 2030, the hospital will provide full inpatient services with its 400 patient beds, as well as outpatient services of 400 000 annual attendances.
Construction is also well underway and above the foundations for the North District Hospital (NDH) extension in Sheung Shui. The expansion of NDH mainly covers the construction of a new hospital block, refurbishment, alteration and addition to existing hospital building, and the provision of associated internal roadworks as well as external and landscaping works. Upon completion of the expansion project in about 2028, the hospital will provide about 1,500 additional beds, atop of its 680 existing beds.
And then comes the mother of all hospitals: The Northern Metropolis Hospital in Ngau Tam Mei, south of Yuen Long, is developing a new integrated medical teaching and research hospital which will become the flagship hospital of the Northern Metropolis with about 3 000 beds, providing comprehensive healthcare services for the new population in the area.
Last year in his policy address, the Chief Executive John Lee announced plans for developing a new integrated medical teaching and research hospital which will become the flagship hospital of the Northern Metropolis, providing comprehensive healthcare services.
The area is a goldmine for development. Representing about one third of Hong Kong’s total land area, existing agricultural land and fishponds will be turned into a massive hub for international scientific and technical research and development.
In the First Hospital Development Plan, there are three projects in two clusters, including the expansion of North District Hospital, the redevelopment of Prince of Wales Hospital, and the extension of Operating Theatre Block for Tuen Mun Hospital. It is anticipated that a total of 1 950 additional beds and other hospital facilities will be provided by 2031 in the New Territories after the completion of the three projects, bringing the physical bed capacity in the east and west clusters in the New Territories to about 12 000 beds.
Most importantly on the backburner is a decision by the Chief Executive in Council (ExCo) last year that a site of about two hectares be reserved in the San Tin Technopole (between Yuen Long and Sheung Shui) for healthcare facilities “which may include private hospital use.”
A private hospital in the New Territories opens up many possibilities, including medical tourism.
The Chinese medical hospital will draw in many tourists from the mainland and Asia seeking medical help through traditional Chinese and western medicine methods. A tourism hospital situated along the Chinese boundary will boost tourism figures ten-fold.
A case in point is the Bumrungrad International Hospital in Bangkok, Thailand. It is a classic example of how the private sector can benefit in healthcare. Founded in 1980, Bumrungrad International Hospital has been a global pioneer in providing world-class healthcare services and international patient support for nearly four decades. The hospital is an internationally accredited, multi-specialty hospital listed on the Stock Exchange of Thailand since 1989. It is, perhaps the largest private hospital in Southeast Asia, caring for more than 1.1 million patients annually from more than 190 countries.
