The resignation yesterday from the Hong Kong court of final appeal of the two most senior judges on the UK Supreme Court sends a clear message that Britain will no longer lend legitimacy to the corrupt Hong Kong judicial system.
The remaining six UK judges who sit on the court of final appeal should follow the lead set by Lords Reed and Hodge, and resign from this charade masquerading as a free and fair legal system.
For many years after Britain’s return of the territory to China in 1997, UK judges have sat on Hong Kong’s court as part of the UK’s effort to safeguard the rule of law and judicial independence in the territory.
However, since the promulgation of the repressive national security law in 2020, the rights and freedoms long enjoyed by Hong Kongers have been systematically dismantled in a relentless crusade against the city’s pro-democracy movement.
In its totalitarian overhaul of the territory, Beijing and its collaborators have co-opted the city’s judiciary and wielded it as a weapon in its ongoing crackdown on dissent.
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To date, the Hong Kong regime has jailed dozens of peaceful protesters, lawyers and former opposition politicians under trumped-up national security law charges. The detainees are often denied bail, while the law is that national security cases are to be tried in juryless courts presided over by handpicked judges.
British judges have yet to hear national security cases. Even so, Andrew Cheung, the chief justice of Hong Kong’s top court, revealed earlier this year that overseas judges, most of whom are British, could be designated to hear cases under the security legislation. It is to be hoped that yesterday’s announcement makes that less likely.
But their absence from security law cases has not precluded UK judges from being complicit in the campaign to crush dissent. In September, Lord Reed issued a ruling that rolled back protections from criminal prosecution for members of the Hong Kong legislative council, who take part in peaceful protest in the chamber.
The ruling was used last month to imprison Fernando Cheung, a former pro-democracy lawmaker, for three weeks after he was found guilty of contempt for chanting slogans during a committee meeting in 2020.
The outdated argument frequently cited in defence of UK judges’ continued service is that their presence helps to preserve the rule of law in Hong Kong. However, with Chinese officials warning Hong Kong’s courts to uphold Beijing’s will or risk losing their remaining vestiges of independence, while government-appointed judges jail activists for speech crimes, the pretence that the remaining UK judges can maintain the rule of law and judicial independence is not only fanciful, it is dangerous.
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It provides cover and credibility to a compromised legal system in which the rule of law and meaningful judicial independence no longer exist.
Alistair Carmichael is the Liberal Democrat MP chairman of the all-party parliamentary group on Hong Kong
