This problem is typified in the case ZN v. Indeed, Hong Kong’s continued reluctance to pass the Modern Slavery Bill of 2017 demonstrates its relatively conservative stance on basic human rights. These initiatives had upgraded Hong Kong to Tier 2 in 2019 (a tier above the Tier 2 Watch List), but as Justice Centre Hong Kong points out, they lack any definition or offense of human trafficking and forced labor and do not specify appropriate prosecution of traffickers or make proposals for anti-trafficking legislation, and thus are little more than attempts to appease the international community without taking any real action. Hong Kong rejected these findings as biased, relying heavily on the fact that it had created two initiatives to address the issue: the Steering Committee to Tackle Trafficking in Persons to Enhance Protection of Foreign Domestic Helpers and the Action Plan to Tackle Trafficking Persons and to Enhance Protection of Foreign Domestic Helpers in Hong Kong of 2018. It found that Hong Kong had overlooked many cases with clear indicators of trafficking and failed to adopt an appropriate approach to interviewing the victims. Consequently, in its 2020 Trafficking in Persons Report, the State Department downgraded Hong Kong to the Tier 2 Watch List, the second-lowest tier. ![]() Despite the resources designated for hiring and training government employees in trafficking issues, the government did not convict, prosecute, or even investigate any potential labor trafficking claims it pursued only claims of sex trafficking. In addition, out of 136 potential sex trafficking cases in 2019, the Hong Kong government investigated only fourteen. For example, the Employment Ordinance allows employees to recover unpaid wages which may result from trafficking but does not address trafficking itself. Other statutes that the government points to address only the symptoms of trafficking. While the government claims that existing law adequately protects against trafficking, only Section 129 of the Crimes Ordinance specifically addresses trafficking, and even then, it only applies to trafficking for prostitution. This could not be further from the truth. This is due to Hong Kong’s insistence that trafficking is not a widespread issue in the city, and that victims are otherwise sufficiently protected by existing legislation. By contrast, the Palermo Protocol, which protects against trafficking, was ratified by the People’s Republic of China and extended to the Macao Special Administrative Region but not to Hong Kong. During the handover of power in 1997, the Chinese government agreed that the provisions previously extended to Hong Kong would still apply, and Article 39 of Hong Kong’s Constitution applied Article 8 of the ICCPR, which concerns trafficking of persons, to Article 4 of Hong Kong’s Bill of Rights (BOR4) - copying it almost word for word. In 1976, when Hong Kong was still a British colony and dependent territory, the United Kingdom ratified the International Covenant of Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) with reservations and extended this to Hong Kong. To understand this issue more deeply, we must look at the international laws regarding human trafficking. However, even before the NSL, Hong Kong’s idealized image concealed the more conservative nature of its courts, specifically in their reluctance to extend international human rights norms domestically, and the city’s general attitude towards its foreign domestic helpers (FDHs), who are at high risk of being trafficked for forced labor. Now, some argue that Hong Kong’s courts are the last bastion of rights protection in a city where the legislative and executive branches have aligned themselves with the Chinese Communist Party. ![]() Before the passage of the National Security Law (NSL) last summer, Hong Kong, at least at first glance, seemed to be a beacon of progress and justice, a legacy that continued from its time as a British colony.
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