30 September 2024 – Lord Nicholas Phillips has stepped down from the Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal citing “personal reasons”. Lord Phillips has served a total of 12 years on the city’s highest court.
Phillips has become the fourth judge to step down this year following British Law Lords, Collins and Sumption and Canadian judge Beverley McLachlin. Both British judges cited the political situation in Hong Kong as the reason for standing down, with Lord Sumption going as far to say that Hong Kong “is slowly becoming a totalitarian state” and that the “rule of law in Hong Kong is in grave danger.”
Six judges remain on the Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal, two from the United Kingdom and four from Australia. The Hong Kong Judiciary has stated that they are looking to identify replacements for those judges who have stepped down. Of the British judges in particular, Lord David Neuberger made headlines for choosing to resign his position as chair of the High-Level Panel of Legal Experts on Media Freedom rather than to step down from his position in Hong Kong, stating that “it is undesirable that focus on my position as a non-permanent Judge in Hong Kong should take away, or distract, from the critical and impactful work of the High-Level Panel.” This follows on from Lord Neuberger dismissing the appeal case for seven pro-democracy figures in Hong Kong, including pro-democracy newspaper owner and British citizen, Jimmy Lai.
In May, a report by the Committee for Freedom in Hong Kong (CFHK) Foundation, entitled: “Lending Prestige to Persecution: How Foreign Judges are Undermining Hong Kong’s Freedoms and Why they Should Quit” was launched in the British Parliament. The report states, “When judges are routinely sending Hong Kong teenagers to jail for exercising their freedom of expression, these judges must understand that their presence offers no positive impact for the people of Hong Kong. They only help to maintain the illusion of rule of law. The judges must resign.”
The Committee for Freedom in Hong Kong Foundation urges the remaining six overseas non-permanent judges to immediately resign their positions, to stop giving credibility to a legal system that is playing an active role in the destruction of the rule of law, human rights, and democracy in Hong Kong.
Although we welcome the decision for Lord Nicholas Phillips to not renew his contract with Hong Kong’s top court, we are appalled that it took him so long to take this decision, given the series of high-profile pro-democracy persecutions that he would have seen take place, and that several of his fellow judges had already chosen to step down.
Alyssa Fong, Public Affairs and Advocacy Manager for the CFHK Foundation and author of the report “Lending Prestige to Persecution”, said:
“It is great to see another overseas non-permanent judge stepping down from their role in the Hong Kong courts. The more foreign judges resign, the less the Hong Kong Government can use these judges to give their human rights abuses this false air of credibility. I urge Phillips’ fellow common law judges from the UK and Australia to immediately follow suit. It is dumbfounding that some judges continue to choose to ruin their reputations and their integrity for the Hong Kong authorities and Chinese Communist Party.”