Dear Editor,
Your editorial “No Escape From Hong Kong” (April 28), is wildly inaccurate. It is wrong to imply that the Immigration (Amendment) Bill 2020 will “block people from leaving” Hong Kong or to suggest broad extraterritorial reach.
First, the Bill specifically aims to stop potential claimants from entering Hong Kong, expedite the handling of non-refoulement claims and prevent delaying tactics by some. There’re currently over 13,000 such claimants.
Second, our constitutional document, the Basic Law, guarantees Hong Kong residents the right to travel and to leave and enter Hong Kong. The Bill does not impinge on that right.
Third, I have stated publicly in the Legislative Council (LegCo) that the subsidiary legislation to be made will clearly set out that the regulations will apply only to carriers, passengers and crew heading to Hong Kong.
I must also point out that Section 6A of the Bill, apart from helping to stop potential claimants at source, will also provide the legal basis to implement the Advanced Passenger Information (API) system which the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) had in 2018 directed members to introduce. More than 90 members have so far implemented the API, including Member States of the European Union, Canada and the United States.
As a major global aviation hub, an ICAO member and responsible partner of the international community, Hong Kong lives up to its responsibility to promote cross-border safety and security.
It is totally incorrect to suggest that the Bill will be used to prevent people from leaving Hong Kong.
Yours sincerely,
John K.C. Lee
Secretary for Security
Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region