Intellasia East Asia News – Dead end to a two-way street? The stakes for the US in HK extradition treaty suspension

The United States has moved to suspend its extradition treaty with Hong Kong, joining Australia and Canada which have also taken such action, over concerns that a new national security law would erode the city’s freedoms and semi-autonomy from Beijing.

While these governments have said it would be necessary to protect its nationals from the sweeping law that allows prosecution in mainland China, it could come at the cost of not being able to bring fugitives home for justice.

Hong Kong ranked 18 among 137 countries that extradited or deported people to the United States between 2003 and 2012, according to the latest data available from the US Marshals Service.

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The special administrative region has made 47 extraditions to the US in that period.

There are few details about these cases, with most dealt with by the US and Hong Kong judicial branches away from the public eye. These include the extradition of Rita Law in December 2013 from Hong Kong to the US over allegations of operating a prostitution ring and Muhammad Fahd from Hong Kong to the US in August 2019 to face charges of illegally unlocking mobile phones for profit, according to the US Department of Justice.

Hong Kong Police Force releases also reveal the extradition of fugitives from the US, including the transfer of an unidentified man in January 2001 wanted in connection with deception cases involving $1.96 million.

In one instance, Hong Kong officers were commended by their counterparts in San Francisco for helping arrest and extradite Joe Chen, who was wanted on murder charges in the US, in February 2002.

In 2013, US officials asked for Edward Snowden’s arrest on a provisional warrant in Hong Kong, but he was not stopped by Hong Kong authorities and left for Russia.

Colin Cohen, a Hong Kong-based lawyer experienced in dealing with extradition cases, said there was a wide range of cases involved, including money laundering and drug dealing. Cohen said Hong Kong’s rule of law and “excellent” judges had traditionally made it a good partner for countries on extradition.

“In the world we are living in today, crimes have no border and therefore we see countries having extensive cooperation on that… In the end I think it works both ways and as far as I understand I think the United States has asked for more extraditions than Hong Kong,” Cohen said.

The US consulate in Hong Kong declined to comment when requested by the South China Morning Post on how US extradition with Hong Kong would change under the national security law.

Washington has recognised Hong Kong’s role in law enforcement cooperation in the past.

The 2003 Hong Kong Policy Act Report called “law enforcement cooperation” between the two jurisdictions “a central pillar of US-Hong Kong relations”. The report was submitted by the US State Department to Congress on key developments in Hong Kong.

“US-Hong Kong agreements on extradition, prisoner transfer and mutual legal assistance, in effect since 1998, 1999, and 2000, respectively, all continued to function smoothly in most instances,” the document said, adding that “during the period covered by this report” Hong Kong extradited eight people to the US, while the US extradited three to Hong Kong that year.

However, reports in recent years have shown a shift in tone and language that highlights a deterioration in legal cooperation.

“Hong Kong generally remains a good partner for fugitive surrender and sharing of evidence in criminal cases,” US authorities said in the 2018 and 2019 Hong Kong Policy Act reports after the Hong Kong government refused to extradite a fugitive to the US.

Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor was reported to have turned down the extradition request concerning a hacker from Macau who was arrested in Hong Kong while accused of breaking into US law firms’ computers and making millions from stock trades fuelled by ill-gotten information.

The detainee was released into “central government custody” on the basis that Beijing was “pursuing a separate criminal action”, the Hong Kong Policy Act Report in 2018 said.

“This was the first such instance since 1997,” it said of the refusal, referring to the date Hong Kong returned to Chinese sovereignty. “The central government has provided no information as to the disposition of its own case against the individual.”

The whereabouts of the Macau detainee remain unknown, and the Hong Kong government has declined to comment on the case apart from saying that the government handled the surrender of fugitive offenders in accordance with the law.

Despite repeating in the 2019 report that the mainland Chinese government did not provide help to the case, the report that year still noted the effective extradition from Hong Kong and gave credit for help extraditing “two fugitive surrender cases for persons to be prosecuted in the United States”.

https://sg.news.yahoo.com/dead-end-two-way-street-070223168.html

 

Category: Hong Kong