Hong Kong to go ahead with extradition laws despite massive protest

Hong Kong’s Chief Executive Carrie Lam signalled today that her government will go ahead with proposed amendments to its extradition laws despite a massive protest against them. She told reporters the legislation is important and will help Hong Kong uphold justice and fulfill its international obligations. Safeguards added in May will ensure that the legislation protects human rights, she said.

In what appeared to be Hong Kong’s largest protest in more than a decade, hundreds of thousands of people marched through central Hong Kong on Sunday, three days before the Legislative Council is slated to take up the bill.

Hong Kong was guaranteed the right to retain its own social, legal and political systems for 50 years under an agreement reached before its 1997 return to China from British rule.