HONG KONG - June 2005 Zi Teng report Police abuse of migrant sex workers.

As an international city, Hong Kong claims herself as a place of practicing the rule of law and respecting human rights. Nevertheless, our Police Force has committed such a shameful act, badly treating arrested people suspicious of working in Hong Kong without permits. The incident has become a shame for Hong Kong people and an international scandal in human rights overnight.

Three days ago, The Police Force launched its large-scale enforcement. They arrested a group of people suspicious of illegally working as sex workers, and treated them with torture. They retained over 80 people in a tiny iron cage of 200 square metre. There was plenty of rubbish and leftovers inside the cage. The people there had to suffer from the heat emitted from air-conditioners nearby and the severe sunshine for thirteen hours, allowing other people to watch them and take pictures.

The incident is only tip of an iceberg. Zi Teng has received a lot of complaints from Mainlanders against the abuse of power by the Police Force. In its enforcement against the sex industry, all girls wearing sexy clothes would be arrested and afterwards be beaten, imposed with faked evidences and forced to sign the statement under threat. Once admitting their act of providing sex services, those girls would be repatriated. If denying the charge, the girls would be detained for four months to await court hearings and lose their freedom. The innocents have already been penalized. In the course of enforcement against this group of migrant workers who suffer from social discrimination, the Police officers will even take the chance to force the sex workers to provide sex services without paying the money just like raping them. For migrants, all complaint mechanisms are ineffective.

The above is the behaviour of a totalitarian state adopted to deal with her people. The Hong Kong Police Force use the same kind of violent acts and spiritual torturing to treat people suspicious of being “illegal workers”. Even people convicted of crimes should receive the basic human right protection. What is ironic is that the Police Force has exercised such torture without court ruling against people from outside Hong Kong who have limited knowledge of local laws and legal procedures. We have justifications to believe that the Police Force, using such inhuman way to force people to admit the criminal charges, has seriously affected the rule of law in Hong Kong.

Zi Teng condemned the way that the Police Force arrested people found staying in Hong Kong illegally. Zi Teng strongly urges:

1. the Police Force to apologise;
2. the Police Force to disclose its legal procedures and guidelines on handling the arrest of people found illegally staying in Hong Kong;
3. the Security Bureau to set up an independent mechanism as an appropriate channel for migrants to lodge their complaints with a view to rescuing the reputation of Hong Kong as a place of respecting human rights and the rule of law;
4. immediately stop all kinds of abuse of power by the Police Force

Letter by Zi Teng, June 2005