Democracy campaigners welcome move by Lord Sumption and Lord Collins, who cited political situation in statement
Two of the last remaining British judges to sit on Hong Kong’s top court have resigned, with one citing the political situation in the former colony.
Overseas judges on Hong Kong’s top court have been a fixture of the city’s legal system, which unlike mainland China’s is derived from English common law, since the handover from British to Chinese rule in 1997. because of concerns about endorsing an administration that appeared to have “departed from values of political freedom, and freedom of expression”.
Fong said: “We have long advocated that no foreign judges should continue to give any form of credibility to the Hong Kong courts and authoritarian crackdown” and called for the remaining judges to resign. The Hong Kong 47 trial was presided over by a panel of judges handpicked by the chief executive to handle national security cases. The involvement of the Beijing-backed chief executive in choosing judges for national security cases – which can be heard without a jury – raises questions about the robustness of the English common law system, which dictates that the judiciary should be independent from the government.
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