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Human Rights Issues -- April 2001
One More SAR Professor detained in China (1 April 2001)
One More SAR Professor detained in China (1 April 2001)
One more SAR professor is being detained on the Mainland for unknown reason. Human Rights Monitors said Hong Kong resident Mr. Xu Zerong, who works at Guangzhou's Zhongshan University, was arrested by agents of the Ministry of State Security last August.
Mr. Xu, 45, received his doctorate degree in political science from Oxford University. He is a specialist on communism in southeast Asia and the Korean War. He is reported to be arrested after the publication in July of an article in the weekly magazine Yazhou Zhoukan in china on Chinese aid to the Malayan communist party between 1960 and 1980. The editor-in-chief of the magazine said he was surprised to hear the detention news of Mr. Xu. Mr. Xu's family in Hong Kong did not receive any news about him since his arrest.
The SAR Government said it had not been inform about the detention of Mr. Xu and receive no request for help from his family.
Couple won Review Case against the Decision by the Immigration Department for application for a dependent's visa (4 April 2001)
Ms Yu Pik-ling and Mr. Joseph Orizu won the case of fighting with the decision made by the Immigration Department of his application for a dependent's visa.
The couple fell in love in 1998 and got marry in Hong Kong. The Nigerian-born husband had tried to apply for a dependent's visa for three times but the Immigration Department approved none of it. During the application process, they had been asked separately about their family life such as the color of bathing towel the other used. The Immigration Department concluded that their marriage was a "sham".
The couple took the case to the High Court for review but Justice Andrew Chung On-tak rejected their application for a review of the decision made by the Immigration Department in September 2000. The High Court now ordered the case should be back to the power court for consideration.
It was the first time of the High Court would consider whether Article 37 of the Basic Law overrides the Director of Immigration Department's discretionary powers under the Immigration Ordinance. The Article 37 states that "The freedom of marriage of Hong Kong residents and their right to raise a family freely shall be protected by law." Their solicitor, Mark Delay, said the decision "should set a precedent for similar case" as the Article 37 of the Basic Law had never been considered by a full court hearing. The rights guaranteed in Article 37 also enshrines under international treaties.
In 1994, the UN Committee on economic, Social and Cultural Rights had expressed its concern of the "relatively low level of awareness of, and interest on, international human-rights law on the part of the judiciary."