Hong Kong’s legislature handed a authorized modification on Wednesday to forestall international legal professionals engaged on nationwide safety circumstances, a restriction critics say will undermine honest trials and the correct of defendants to decide on their legal professionals.
The modification enshrines in regulation a ruling from China’s high lawmaking physique final December that Hong Kong courts should get the approval of the town’s chief earlier than admitting a international lawyer with out Hong Kong {qualifications} for nationwide safety circumstances.
The usage of international legal professionals by each prosecutors and defence has lengthy been a part of the rule of regulation traditions within the former British colony and in recent times some have turn into concerned in defending critics of the Beijing-backed metropolis authorities.
The December ruling by China’s Nationwide Folks’s Congress Standing Committee adopted an enchantment to it by metropolis chief John Lee after the town’s Division of Justice had tried unsuccessfully to dam British lawyer Timothy Owen from defending media tycoon and China critic Jimmy Lai.
Lai, 75, founding father of now shut pro-democracy newspaper Apple Every day, faces a complete of 4 expenses below the safety regulation and a colonial-era sedition regulation.
Below Wednesday’s modification, a international lawyer cannot become involved in nationwide safety circumstances until the town’s chief has ample grounds for believing that the lawyer’s involvement shouldn’t be opposite to the pursuits of nationwide safety. It is going to be determined case-by-case.
Defending the modification, Secretary for Justice Paul Lam instructed the town’s Legislative Council that Hong Kong had greater than 100 senior counsels and 1,500 barristers, so defendants might select appropriate authorized representatives amongst them.
“The invoice complies with … the Hong Kong Nationwide Safety Regulation on respecting and defending the human rights and freedoms, nor does it deprive any individuals’s authorized rights,” Lam mentioned.
The invoice was handed unanimously.
British-based authorized scholar Eric Lai mentioned the modification allowed for a broad authorities interpretation of what constituted a nationwide safety case, and subsequently who may be allowed to become involved in it.
It could additionally discourage some international legal professionals from getting Hong Kong restricts international legal professionals from nationwide safety circumstances concerned, he mentioned.
“The imprecise definition of ‘circumstances regarding nationwide safety’ within the invoice implies that the federal government can arbitrarily use the brand new powers to permit or prohibit international legal professionals from taking over native circumstances, no matter civil or prison, on the over-broad floor of ‘nationwide safety’,” Lai mentioned.
Beijing imposed the nationwide safety regulation on Hong Kong in 2020 after months of anti-government protests. It punishes acts of subversion, terrorism, collusion with international forces and secession with as much as life imprisonment.
Jimmy Lai’s authorized staff filed a authorized problem final month after Hong Kong’s nationwide safety committee suggested the Immigration Division to refuse Owen a brand new visa. A call shall be handed down by a Excessive Courtroom choose.
