The People’s Republic of China flag and the Hong Kong SAR flag are hoisted on the Court of Final Appeal in the Central District in Hong Kong, China, on October 28, 2020. A total of five foreign judges have now resigned from the court this year. Photo by Jerome Favre/EPA-EFE
Sept. 30 (UPI) — A British judge of the Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal has resigned, making him the latest foreign justice to leave the apex court this year, according to reports.
Nicholas Addison Phillips, 86, is stepping down due to “personal reasons,” the judiciary told Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post in a statement.
“He indicated recently that he did not wish to have his term of appointment extended upon its expiry on 30 September 2024 due to personal reasons,” it said.
The statement acknowledged Phillips’ “valuable contribution” to the court, while assuring the public that his absence will not affect the day-to-day dealings of the judiciary.
Phillips has served as a non-permanent judge of the Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal since 2012, according to his official biography published on the judiciary website.
With his resignation, five foreign top court judges have stepped down this year, including two — Judge Lord Jonathan Sumption and Judge Lord Lawrence Collins, both British — who cited the political situation the former British colony.
Sumption, in announcing his resignation in an Financial Times op-ed in June, had said Hong Kong was “becoming a totalitarian state” where, “the rule of law is profoundly compromised in any area about which the government feels strongly.”
Collins, who resigned the same week as Sumption, had said he was stepping down “because of the political situation in Hong Kong” but maintained that “I continue to have the fullest confidence in the court and the total independence of its members.”
Their resignations came after 14 pro-democracy activists were convicted on conspiracy to commit subversion charges under a draconian national security law imposed by Beijing in 2020, and weeks after the release of a report from the Committee for Freedom in Hong Kong Foundation that said foreign judges in the former British colony were providing “legitimacy to Beijing’s crackdown on political freedoms.”
After Sumption and Collins announced their resignations, Hong Kong Watch issued a statement saying overseas judges in the former British colony “must reconsider their role given the deteriorating rule of law in the city.”
“To serve in a judiciary that is losing its independence is to lend prestige to a system that continues to lose its legitimacy — the remaining judges from the UK and Australia should immediately follow suit and resign,” said Benedict Rogers, chief executive officer of Hong Kong Watch.
Hong Kong’s once celebrated freedoms have been under attack by Beijing since 2020, when the Chinese Communist Party enforced a new national security law on the city in response to widespread pro-democracy protests a year earlier.
The new law criminalized secession, sedition, subversion, terrorism and working with foreign agencies to undermine the national security of the People’s Republic of China in Hong Kong.
Broadly defined, the new law empowered law enforcement and the legal system to target pro-democracy politicians and activists, many of whom were arrested or fled overseas.
After the announcement of Phillips’ resignation, Rogers on Monday published a single-word statement: “Good.”
