Slowly but surely the ongoing festering extradition debacle between Australia and Hong Kong is gaining prominence. The Sydney Morning Herald reports that HK Chief Exec Tung Che-hwa is close to making a formal complaint to Prime Minister John Howard and contrasts Australia's obstructionism with an anti-corruption pact signed late last year.

The chief executive of the Chinese territory, Tung Chee-hwa, is believed to be moving closer to a direct protest to Howard over an unexpected Australian obstacle to a legal case regarded as important to clearing up Hong Kong's construction industry.

The obstacle appeared when the Federal Justice Minister, Chris Ellison, blocked the extradition of the two Australian executives wanted in Hong Kong to stand trial over alleged irregularities at the Tung Chung development. Despite the Australian courts having approved the extradition, Ellison has not explained the grounds for his decision...

As a result, Australia's standing in the key Asia financial centre has been damaged, and the previously smooth-running extradition arrangements between the two legal jurisdictions have been put under strain. Given the potential for misuse of Hong Kong's open financial system and free trading port by money launderers and triads, this would be a major gap in Australia's legal armour...

Hong Kong law officials suspect Ellison's unexplained decision signals a wider interruption to a previously trouble-free extradition arrangement, and some have angrily suggested Hong Kong should go slow on Australian requests. "The initial reaction was if Australia can't be reasonable, why should we be reasonable?" one senior Hong Kong official said.

There have also been racial overtones, with some Hong Kong officials suggesting Ellison did not want to send white Australians back to face justice in an Asian court. "It has given Hong Kong people a very unfavourable impression of what Australian justice is about," Hong Kong's Secretary for Education, Li Kwok-cheung, said in Australia last week...

Hong Kong ministers and officials are increasingly riled that diplomatic protests, conveyed through the Australian Consulate-General, are not being acknowledged as such by either Ellison or the Foreign Minister, Alexander Downer, who continue to insist relations are not being damaged.

There's plenty more in the article. Read the whole thing. Australia is doing a fine job of disgracing itself in Hong Kong. Unless Minister Ellison comes up with a compelling reason for not extraditing these men it is going to cause even more significant damage to Australia.

Just imagine the uproar in Australia if the situation was reversed.

posted by Simon on 05.18.04 at 02:54 PM in the