UK suspends Hong Kong extradition treaty and extends China arms embargo to the city
According to CNN, the UK will suspend its extradition treaty with Hong Kong "immediately and indefinitely" due to the controversial national security law implemented in the city by mainland China.
Addressing lawmakers, Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab expressed his concerns over the lack of legal and judicial safeguards for citizens living under the new national security legislation, warning Beijing that "the United Kingdom is watching. And the whole world is watching."
"The imposition of this new national security legislation has significantly changed key assumptions underpinning our extradition treaty arrangements with Hong Kong," Raab said in the UK Parliament Monday.
"We will not consider reactivating those arrangements unless and until there are clear and robust safeguards which are able to prevent extradition from the UK being misused under the new national security legislation," Raab told the House of Commons.
Raab said the UK sought a "positive, constructive" and reciprocal relationship with China, but that the new security law was "a clear and serious violation of the UK-China Joint Declaration and with it a violation of China's freely assumed international obligations."
He said he was "particularly concerned" about articles 55 to 59 of the law, which he said gave Chinese authorities the ability to assume jurisdiction over certain cases, and to try those cases in mainland Chinese courts without legal or judicial safeguards.
As part of the British government's new arrangements, the UK's arms embargo on China will also be extended to the semi-autonomous city, including on lethal weapons and equipment which could be used for internal repression.
"There will be no exports from the UK to Hong Kong of potentially lethal weapons, their components or ammunition. It will also mean a ban on the export of any equipment, not already banned, which might be used for internal repression," he added.
The UK has already said it will provide a path to citizenship for up to 3 million Hong Kongers following China's imposition of the new law, and Raab said the bespoke immigration route would be ready by early next year, with details to be announced before Parliament's summer recess begins on Thursday.
He said he welcomed the fact that Australia, Canada and the US have taken a range of measures with respect to Hong Kong, including variously export controls and extradition, as well as measures proposed by the EU on July 13.
Speaking about China during a visit to a school in Kent, southeast England, the UK Prime Minister said his government had "concerns about the treatment of the Uyghur minority obviously, about the human rights abuses," promising a "tough" yet balanced approach towards the world's second largest economy, without abandoning the UK's "policy of engagement."
