HK Prisoners in China Part 2

 

HK Prisoners in China Part 2

Our inquiries confirm Amnesty's findings that there is a common pattern in the detention of prisoners. They are often held for several months without being charged, often denied permission to contact their families, friends or seek legal advice and tried without the right to plead their case. Many were sentenced to several years in prison, often without the knowledge of their families.

In one case, the mother of a Hongkong-born detainee read about her son's plight in a newspaper, a year after his detention. After contacting the Chinese authorities, she was asked to produce three boxes of documents that her son had left in her safekeeping and she believes the contents were later used against him.

He was held in prison for 26 months without trial during which time his mother was not allowed to visit him.

We object to the imprisonment of people for prolonged periods. We'd like to see them charged and tried as quickly as possible, said Miss de Costa. Apart from mounting letter campaigns to put pressure on the Chinese Government, a strategy that Amnesty employs, it would appear little can be done to speed up the process of law.

Chinese notions of justice lag far behind those in the West and like it or not, they can be brutal," said a political analyst. So what can be done for political prisoners who find themselves on the wrong side of the law in China? Apparently very little.

The issue is a sensitive one for the Hongkong Government which cannot offer consular protection to Hongkong-born residents. Since most Hongkong Chinese enter China on a "hui xiang zheng," a kind of multiple re-entry visa for Overseas Chinese issued by the Chinese Government, travelers forfeit any consular protection and place themselves under Chinese jurisdiction.

"It doesn't matter whether your birthplace is Hongkong because as soon as you step on to Chinese soil, you are considered a Chinese national and it would be improper for the Government to interfere with the laws of another country," said Mr. Ian MacCallum, of the civil rights group Justice.

That view was echoed in a British parliamentary question raised on July 20, 1982. When asked what consular assistance was offered by London to citizens of the United Kingdom and its colonies, the British Government disclosed that those ethnic Chinese of Hongkong who are citizens of the UK and colonies and citizens of the People's Republic of China are not entitled to official consular protection within China.

But there have been instances where the Hongkong Government has been known to make inquiries through channels other than official consular ones.

In one case, the colleagues of a civil servant became worried when he failed to turn up at work. It was established he had gone to China for a visit and disappeared.

 After making inquiries through official channels, it is now understood the man was sentenced to between five to eight years in prison and is working out his term in a labour camp. It is also understood the civil servant's junior rank ruled out the possibility of treason.

Our information is there have been other cases of civil servants disappearing. But it is understood the number is very small.

However, it is not only Government employees for whom inquiries are made. Sometimes they result from lobbying by local human rights groups.