No Proof Extradition 'loophole' Was Deliberate: CE

Chief Executive Carrie Lam on Wednesday reiterated the government's assertion that there is a loophole in the SAR's legislation on extraditions, rebuffing a claim by the Bar Association that she and other senior officials have been misleading the public.

Lam was responding to a question in Legco from the Democratic Party's Andrew Wan, who quoted the Bar Association as saying the fact that people cannot currently be extradited to other parts of China is the result of a deliberate decision made when the current legislation was enacted in 1997.

Wan also said that given the very different legal systems in Hong Kong and the mainland, Chinese leaders had also agreed that there should be a separation between the two sides.

But Lam said she doesn't think there are any records backing up such an explanation for the geographical restrictions in the ordinance.

"In any event, in today's circumstances there is indeed a loophole. What I mean is, there is a gap. People may use legitimate means to evade something... as a result of the geographical restriction, in some cases it is impossible to surrender a fugitive offender," she said.

The SAR government says the "loophole" was exposed by the murder of a Hong Kong woman in Taiwan last year, with the island's authorities unable to put their only suspect in the case on trial because he returned to Hong Kong following the killing.

A bill amending the ordinance to allow extraditions on a case-by-case basis to any jurisdiction in the world, including Taiwan and the mainland, was to be put to Legco on Wednesday for its first reading.