Abstract
This Article proceeds in three parts. Part I (The constitutional systems of the Special Administrative Regions of Hong Kong and Macau) introduces the readers to the historical background of Hong Kong and Macau and the “one country, two systems” constitutional orders in force in the Hong Kong and the Macau Special Administrative Regions of the People’s Republic of China. It also informs on the most relevant constitutional developments occurring in the first two decades of existence of these two special regions. Part II (Judicial cooperation in criminal matters in the Special Administrative Regions) explains how such constitutional orders influence the extant legal framework on judicial cooperation in criminal matters, which applies to external cooperation with other states or territories, but not to cooperation between the different jurisdictions within China, for which there are no positive rules currently in force. This part surveys the rules in force in Hong Kong and Macau concerning the surrender of fugitives to other countries. Part III (The surrender of fugitives to Mainland China) focuses particularly on the issue of arrest and return of Chinese citizens from Hong Kong and Macau to Mainland China. It provides an overview of the cases that came to public attention and the legal conundrums created by the absence of “two systems” specific rules on surrender of fugitives within “one country”.
Highlights
This part surveys the rules in force in Hong Kong and Macau concerning the surrender of fugitives to other countries
Part III (The surrender of fugitives to Mainland China) focuses on the issue of arrest and return of Chinese citizens from Hong Kong and Macau to Mainland China. It provides an overview of the cases that came to public attention and the legal conundrums created by the absence of “two systems” specific rules on surrender of fugitives within “one country”
While third options were available105, what is more important to highlight in the conclusion of this Article is that this high level ‘judiciary clash’ is nothing but one extreme example of the difficulties, tensions or frictions inherent in attempts to find the proper operation of “one country, two systems”, an ingenious principle and idea and a multidimensional concept, which different layers, after two decades of implementation, are still unfolding
Summary
40 The use of the expression “the Special Administrative Region[s] may”, which logically implies “may not”, surely reinforces the argument that the adoption of some sort of negotiated agreements between the Mainland and the SARs to regulate judicial cooperation in criminal matters is not excluded from the scope of the provision On this see BINGZHI, Zhao, Estudo dobre a questão da cooperação judiciária em matéria penal entre o interior da China e as Regiões Administrativas Especiais de Hong Kong e de Macau, Revista Jurídica de Macau, número especial, 2004, p.
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