AI Review on Hong Kong (1)- Threats to freedom of assembly, excessive force used

(excerpt) by Amnesty International, 29th June 2007-

Threats to freedom of assembly and police use of excessive force

On 23 February 1997, China’s National People’s Congress Standing Committee (NPCSC) resolved that parts of the Public Order Ordinance (POO) contradicted the Basic Law and should therefore not be adopted as law of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR). No further details were given as to why the POO was considered to breach the Basic Law, but on 1 July 1997, highly controversial amendments to the Public Order Ordinance were introduced by the Provisional Legislative Council (PLC), the interim body which governed Hong Kong before the election of a new Legislative Council in 1997.

These amendments reintroduced the need to apply for permission to hold demonstrations. The Commissioner of Police had the power to prohibit peaceful public gatherings, not just on public safety and public order grounds but also where he “reasonably considers [it] necessary” “in the interest of national security” and “the protection of the rights and freedoms of others”.

Amnesty International noted then that Hong Kong is party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and is thus bound to respect the rights in this covenant. To this day, concerns remain that provisions of the Public Order Ordinance (POO) in Hong Kong contravene international human rights standards, including rights to freedom of expression and assembly as guaranteed by the ICCPR. On a practical level, Amnesty International considers that the procedure of approval for public demonstrations in the POO is so complicated that this may also compromise the fundamental human right to freedom of expression and assembly.

Over the past ten years. Amnesty International has also raised concerns over apparent excessive use of force by the police when handling demonstrations. For example, at the annual meeting of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) in Hong Kong in September 1997, one group of approximately 10 demonstrators were surrounded by over 150 uniformed and plain clothed police officers as they marched to and from the designated protest site. Access by journalists to protestors was arbitrarily controlled. Five demonstrators were charged after scuffles with police on 21 September 1997 when they tried to leave a restricted area to rejoin members of the public at the end of a march protesting IMF policies. Three demonstrators were charged with “disorderly conduct” and two with assaulting the police. One was acquitted of disorderly conduct when one policeman withdrew his evidence after a video showed it to be incorrect – the remaining disorderly conduct charges were then lessened to offences of obstructing the police. The magistrate also accepted that some of the police officers had exaggerated events.

Over the years, there have been further reports of police use of excessive force against peaceful protests. In August and September 2000, 16 demonstrators, including seven student leaders, were arrested under the POO for failing to give seven days’ notice prior to a demonstration in June. Participants formally complained of excessive use of force by police who had used pepper spray and punched and kicked protesters. The arrests triggered large unauthorized solidarity marches and renewed public scrutiny of the ordinance. In October 2000, the charges were dropped.

In September 2001 a magistrate ruled that police had abused their powers when arresting three protesters during the visit of China’s President Jiang Zemin. Ng Kwok-hung, Sunny Leung Chun-wai and Wan Shu-nam, all members of the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of the Patriotic Democratic Movement in China, were acquitted.

In 2001 and 2002, members of the Falun Gong spiritual movement, a registered society in Hong Kong despite being banned in China, were arrested at peaceful demonstrations and alleged that they were victims of police violence. In August 2002, 16 Falun Gong members were convicted of obstruction during a demonstration in March. There were claims that the trial was politically motivated. In November 2004, an appeal court reversed the convictions for “”public obstruction”” and in April 2005, the Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal overturned all remaining convictions against the remaining eight Falun Gong practitioners for obstructing and assaulting police. The Court judgment pointed out that the police had not paid enough attention to freedom of association, assembly, procession and demonstration as guaranteed by Article 27 of the Basic Law.

In April 2002 there were reports of the use of excessive force in the clearing of right of abode protesters from Chater Garden. It was reported that about 300 police officers and over 50 immigration officers sealed all the exits and charged into the gardens to clear 100 – 200 protesters. They had been peacefully staging rallies there since 10 January 2001 against a Court of Final Appeal ruling that the majority of the 5,114 abode seekers did not have right of stay in Hong Kong and should return to other parts of China. In a press release issued shortly after the protest, Amnesty International urged the Hong Kong authorities to exercise restraint and ensure that minimum force is used to control such protests.

Also in 2002, three prominent activists, Leung Kwok-hung, Fung Ka-keung and Lo Wai-ming, were arrested and charged with organizing an unlawful assembly under the Public Order Ordinance. In November 2002, two other well-known activists were arrested and charged with the same offence after holding a demonstration in May in protest against the arrests of the three activists.

Experience of these events led Amnesty International to issue an Open Letter to the Secretary for Security before the opening of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) Ministerial Conference in December 2005, urging the Security Bureau to ensure that police handling of the planned demonstrations would be proportionate to public order concerns and not undermine public confidence in guarantees of freedom of expression and association. Police used pepper spray, tear-gas and bean-bag rounds against protesters during the demonstrations, prompting accusations by human rights monitors of excessive use of force. More than 1,000 protesters were detained, and several claimed to have been ill-treated in police custody. All 14 South Koreans charged with “unlawful assembly” after protesting outside the conference were acquitted in early 2006, sparking renewed calls for an independent inquiry into the actions of the police during the protests.

Amnesty International continues to urge the HKSAR authorities to bring the Public Order Ordinance into line with international human rights standards and to ensure that police handling of demonstrations is proportionate to public order concerns and complies with HKSAR obligations to protect freedom of expression, association and assembly. ( to be cont’d……)

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- original from AI report: Hong Kong’s return to Chinese sovereignty: ten years on, 29th June 2007