There is a human rights crisis in Hong Kong due to the Beijing-imposed National Security Law passed in 2020, the Mainland Affairs Council said yesterday, as it discussed a report showing that the number of prisoners in the territory has risen by one-third since protests in 2019 against an extradition bill.
The Hong Kong Centre for Human Rights on Nov. 7 released a report on torture and inhumane treatment in Hong Kong, which was shared by the council on social media.
Under Hong Kong’s National Security Law, the territory’s pro-democracy parties have been purged, civil society and freedom of speech have been severely oppressed, and the number of prisoners has increased to 9,280, a record high over the past 10 years, the report said.
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The report highlighted police abuse, pretrial detention, mistreatment in prisons and other instances of torture and inhumane treatment.
The lack of an independent system to report such mistreatments has led to a systematic human rights crisis in Hong Kong, it said.
Since the 2019 protests, the number of incarcerated people in Hong Kong has increased by more than one-third, rising from 6,902 in 2020 to 9,280 this year, it said.
Pretrial detainees have more than doubled in the past 11 years, increasing from 1,561 in 2014 to 3,514 this year and now accounting for 38 percent of all prisoners in the territory, it said.
As of September, 69 percent of people arrested under the National Security Law have been denied bail and 34 of them have been imprisoned for more than 1,000 days, the report said.
The international community must take seriously China’s and Hong Kong’s use of state power and unofficial means to fight, intimidate and suppress human rights defenders, it added.
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