*with Lusa
Former Hong Kong Director of Public Prosecutions Greenville Cross said that the neighbouring SAR’s judiciary is independent, stressing that the United Nations Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (CESCR) has been misinformed about the actual situation on the ground.
“Even the judges themselves say the system is operating extremely well. There has been no interference with the judiciary, which is operating independently. Judges are independent. There has been no instance where judges have been in any way pressured or interfered with,” Cross said on the sidelines of a Business Lunch held by the British Chamber of Commerce in Macao on Thursday.
The United Nations’ CESCR stated in a report released earlier this week that it was concerned about reports that the national security law adopted by Beijing for Hong Kong “has de facto abolished the independence of the judiciary.” The observations are included in a CESCR report which analysed compliance with the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in China, including Hong Kong and Macau.
“Unfortunately, the UN is given the wrong impression by people who are hostile to China about the way in which the system is operating,” said Greenville Cross. He also added that “there have been no situations where judges have felt pressured or interfered with. The judicial system has been working extremely well and the UN has been given the wrong perception by people who are hostile to China about the way in which the system is operating.”
Greenville Cross, who held the position of Director of Public Prosecutions in the Hong Kong SAR between 1997 and 2009, recalled that while two British judges resigned from the Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal, “another six British judges, three Australian and one Canadian, all of them refused to go because they knew from their own experience how well the system is operating.” He noted that “this message is either not getting across in the UN or is being deliberately ignored.”
The UN CESCR said it was “concerned about reports of arrests and trials without due process guarantees by civil society actors, journalists, human rights defenders, lawyers working in the field of human rights (…) and others working to defend economic, social and economic rights. cultural issues, particularly in the context of the 2019-2020 protests.”
The Hong Kong Government promptly reacted by rejecting the Committee’s conclusions on various aspects as being “not only totally unfounded, but also utterly perplexing.”
“The Committee has turned a blind eye to the fact that the fundamental rights and freedoms of Hong Kong residents have already been guaranteed at the constitutional level by the Basic Law,” the SAR authorities added.
Regarding Hong Kong’s National Security Law enacted in mid-2020 after the 2019 large-scale, often violent, anti-government protests, Cross considers that the act has yielded “tangible benefits” for the neighbouring SAR as it has brought back the peace and stability that is always vital for commerce, and it now provides the business world with the confidence it needs going forward.
In his address to BritCham’s luncheon, Cross, who is also Honorary Professor of Law at the University of Hong Kong, said that “any suggestions that businesses might inadvertently violate the National Security Law are misplaced, as the elements of each of the four offences are clearly defined,” adding that there must “always be a guilty act and a guilty mind before a prosecution is instituted, and the requirement of proof of intent to commit the crime, which exists for all serious crimes, cannot be satisfied by mere inadvertence.”
Greenville Cross also expressed confidence in the future of the SARs. He quoted Xi Jinping’s speech when he visited Hong Kong on July 1, 2022, where the President indicated that the One Country Two Systems had been successful, and “must be adhered to over the long run.”
The veteran legal expert recalled “Deng Xiaoping’s hope that the ‘one country, two systems’ principle would endure after 2047, and this necessarily included its legal system.” Therefore, Cross was “delighted by President Xi’s words.”
What applies to Hong Kong is set to be extended to Macau. “It is, I imagine, highly likely that a similar stance will be adopted toward Macau’s future after 2049,” he said.
