Two of Beijing’s state offices in Hong Kong have hit back at a British judge who said the city was turning into a “totalitarian state” after resigning from the Court of Final Appeal.
Beijing’s liaison office and national security office in Hong Kong on Thursday issued two separate statements in response to comments made by Jonathan Sumption, who resigned as a non-permanent overseas judge from the Court of Final Appeal last week, calling him a “pawn” of foreign interference.
After resigning, Sumption wrote an op-ed in Financial Times in which he said the city’s rule of law was in “grave danger” after Beijing imposed a national security law in 2020. Judges, Sumption wrote, had to operate in an “impossible political environment created by China.” His comments prompted city leader John Lee to defend the independence of the city’s court.
Sumption on Wednesday told BBC that the recent conviction of 14 pro-democracy activists of subversion in the city’s largest national security case to date had been the “last straw” leading to his resignation.
In a Chinese-language statement issued on Thursday, a spokesperson for the liaison office said Sumption had violated the professional ethics of a judge by “attacking the verdict of his peers, improperly commenting on on-going trials.” He was also accused of “smearing the legitimacy of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress in drafting and interpreting the national security law.”
“That adequately illustrated [Sumption] was willing to become a tool of the UK’s political manoeuvring and a pawn of foreign interference trying to destroy Hong Kong’s stability,” the spokesperson added.
In a separate statement, also in Chinese, a spokesperson for the Office of Safeguarding National Security defended local judges’ independence in applying the security law.
“[Judges] rule according to facts and the law. They convict and sentence based on evidence,” the spokesperson said. “The procedure is just and the outcome is fair. There is no room for smears.”
The spokesperson said that Sumption would be “stained for his life” because of his comments.
Departure
Sumption was one of three overseas judges sitting in the top court that announced their departure last week. Lawrence Collins, a British senior judge, resigned citing the “political situation” in the city, while Beverley McLachlin, formerly Canada’s chief justice, said she would step down after her terms end in July, citing her wish to spend more time with her family.
Both Collins and McLachlin expressed confidence in the independence of Hong Kong’s courts.
Their departure would leave the number of foreign judges serving the top court at seven, with three from Britain and four from Australia.
David Neuberger, formerly the president of the UK supreme court, reportedly said he would stay “so long as I can do good by being there,” according to British publication The Law Society Gazette.
According to the report, Neuberger said at a legal conference in London on Saturday: “I want to stay and support my judicial colleagues in Hong Kong and support the rule of law as long as I can.”
The senior justice, who has been sitting on the top court since 2009, will hear an appeal from seven veteran democrats including jailed media mogul Jimmy Lai over their convictions in an unlawful assembly case, on June 24.
‘Should not be lightly made’
Overseas judges serving in Hong Kong’s top court are a holdover from the city’s British colonial era. Their presence has been considered key to maintaining Hong Kong’s common law system after it returned to Chinese rule in 1997.
They are appointed as non-permanent judges of the Court of Final Appeal, where they participate in panels on an ad hoc basis alongside three local permanent judges and the chief justice.
Andrew Cheung, the current chief justice in Hong Kong, thanked Sumption for his contribution to the court on Tuesday but said criticism levelled against the judiciary “should not be lightly made.”
“A tension often exists between protection of fundamental rights and safeguarding national security… It is one thing to disagree with a court’s decision, but it is quite another to suggest that fundamental rights have been compromised because of political concerns,” he added.
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