SCMP: Reason for entry denial

Danny Gittingsse

Sunday, May 13, 2001

In recent years, the Government has usually sought to pretend that those ''political troublemakers'' - in other words, anyone disliked by Beijing - whom it refused to allow into Hong Kong had problems with their passports and visas, or some other genuinely immigration-related reason for being denied entry.

[...]

But last week, it abandoned any attempt to continue this increasingly threadbare charade as about 100 Falun Gong followers were denied entry, even though nearly all of them held valid visas or were from countries whose nationals are not required to have them.

Indeed, what was striking about last week's transparent attempt to avoid embarrassing President Jiang Zemin during his presence at the Fortune Global Forum was how little effort was made to pretend there was anything wrong with the travel documents of those turned back. Instead, many of the Falun Gong followers reported being told something close to the truth - namely, that they were being denied entry for ''security reasons''.

No wonder so many foreign governments expressed concern through their local consulates at what the US called such apparently ''arbitrary'' expulsions. After all, in stark contrast to Hong Kong's much-vaunted policy of granting visa-free access to nationals of more than 150 countries, it now seems that even possession of a visa is unlikely to be enough to secure entry - if you happen to have the wrong political or religious beliefs.

Of course, all countries reserve the right to deny entry - even to holders of a valid visa - when there are special reasons to do so, such as a passenger carrying an offensive weapon.

But it now seems that, as far as the SAR Government is concerned, possession of Falun Gong leaflets falls into much the same category as offensive weapons. After all, since many of those refused entry said they had never before run into trouble in Hong Kong, Beijing or elsewhere, the only way immigration officers could have identified them as [group] followers was because a search of their luggage revealed they were carrying literature from the group.

If the Government is now intent on continuing such a politically motivated immigration policy, despite the damage it is doing to Hong Kong's international reputation, then at least it should make this unequivocally clear to potential visitors. Falun Gong followers could be warned they must apply for a special ''troublemakers'' visa, with all applications being personally referred to Secretary for Security Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee for rejection.

That way, at least the present uncertainty would be clarified and no one would waste their money on a fruitless air fare next time.

Danny Gittings (gittings@scmp.com) is the Post's editorial pages editor.

http://focus.scmp.com/ZZZHCFMKYLC.html

 Yearly Archive   Printer Version