Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
06HONGKONG1862
2006-05-04 10:55:00
CONFIDENTIAL
Consulate Hong Kong
Cable title:  

FORMER JUSTICE SECRETARY ELSIE LEUNG TO LEAD

Tags:  PGOV PREL CH HK 
pdf how-to read a cable
VZCZCXRO3887
OO RUEHCN RUEHGH
DE RUEHHK #1862/01 1241055
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
O 041055Z MAY 06
FM AMCONSUL HONG KONG
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC IMMEDIATE 6502
INFO RUEHOO/CHINA POSTS COLLECTIVE PRIORITY
RHEHNSC/NSC WASHDC PRIORITY
C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 HONG KONG 001862 

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DEPARTMENT FOR EAP, EAP/CM
NSC FOR DENNIS WILDER

E.O. 12958: DECL: 05/04/2031
TAGS: PGOV PREL CH HK
SUBJECT: FORMER JUSTICE SECRETARY ELSIE LEUNG TO LEAD
DELEGATION TO THE U.S.

REF: HONG KONG 1816

Classified By: E/P Section Chief Simon Schuchat; Reasons 1.4 (b, d)

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 HONG KONG 001862

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DEPARTMENT FOR EAP, EAP/CM
NSC FOR DENNIS WILDER

E.O. 12958: DECL: 05/04/2031
TAGS: PGOV PREL CH HK
SUBJECT: FORMER JUSTICE SECRETARY ELSIE LEUNG TO LEAD
DELEGATION TO THE U.S.

REF: HONG KONG 1816

Classified By: E/P Section Chief Simon Schuchat; Reasons 1.4 (b, d)


1. (C) Summary: On May 7-18, former Hong Kong Secretary for
Justice Elsie Leung, will lead a "Better Hong Kong
Foundation" (BHKF) delegation to the U.S. to explain
implementation of the "One Country, Two Systems" principle in
Hong Kong since the 1997 handover to the PRC, as well as
other political and economic issues. Leung also may address
the recently revived issue of Article 23 national security
legislation, which a PRC member of the Hong Kong Basic Law
Committee (BLC) recently listed as one of six prerequisites
for universal suffrage in Hong Kong. Responding to those
comments, Leung, who in March was appointed Vice Chair of the
Basic Law Committee, observed that implementation of
universal suffrage in Hong Kong would require community
consensus, and that it would be up to the Hong Kong
Government to determine how to handle the Article 23 issue.
End Summary.

Visit to the U.S.
--------------


2. (SBU) On May 7-18, former Hong Kong Secretary for Justice
Elsie Leung, who retired from Hong Kong Government service
last October, will lead a "Better Hong Kong Foundation"
(BHKF) delegation to Washington (May 7-10),New York City
(May 10-14),Boston (May 14-16) and San Francisco (May
16-18). In Washington, in addition to calls at the
Departments of State and Commerce, the group will meet with
the U.S.-Asia Institute, the Brookings Institution, the Cato
Institute, the U.S.-China Education Trust, the Fund for
American Studies, the Heritage Foundation, the U.S.-China
Working Group, the Center for Strategic and International
Studies, the Capitol Hill Forum, and several media
organizations. In New York, the delegation has scheduled
meetings with a variety of investment banks and other
organizations, including Morgan Stanley, Fortune Magazine,
the Asia Society, the New York County Lawyers Association,
Citibank, Hong Kong Shanghai Bank (HSBC),Standard and
Poor's, the U.S.-Asia Institute, and Chinese media
representatives. In Boston, the BHKF group will participate

in activities at the Fletcher School of Diplomacy of Tufts
University and the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, and
also attend a lunch with corporate and legal leaders. In San
Francisco, the delegation is scheduled to meet with the Hong
Kong Student Association of Stanford University, the Pacific
Council on International Policy, and the Institute of East
Asian Studies at the University of California, Berkeley. In
Washington, New York, and San Francisco the delegation also
will meet representatives of the Hong Kong Economic and Trade
Office and/or the PRC Embassy/Consulates.


3. (SBU) Leung has told the local press that her delegation
plans to discuss progress on implementation of the "One
Country Two Systems" principle in Hong Kong since the 1997
handover to the PRC, but also may address the prospects for
Article 23 National Security legislation for Hong Kong, the
power of the PRC National People's Congress Standing
Committee (NPCSC) to interpret Hong Kong's Basic Law, and
other judicial and legal matters of concern in Hong Kong.
According to BHKF chief executive George Yuen, while in
Washington the group also hopes to learn U.S. views on Hong
Kong and the impact on U.S.-PRC relations of the recent visit
by PRC President Hu Jintao to the U.S. Although the BHKF
annually organizes a visit of this sort to the U.S., Leung
will be leading the group for the first time and may seek to
use it to raise her political profile and agenda.

Elsie Leung
--------------


4. (SBU) In March, Leung was appointed Vice Chairman of the
Hong Kong Basic Law Committee (BLC). This twelve-member
Committee advises the NPCSC on interpretations and amendments
of the Basic Law. While previously the BLC has only convened
meetings intermittently, in advance of interpretations of the
Basic Law by the NPCSC, on May 2 Leung announced that
henceforth the committee would meet twice yearly to study
various aspects of Basic Law implementation, with the first
such meeting to be held soon. At the same time, Leung said
she had no plan to seek election as a Hong Kong deputy to the
NPC.


5. (C) Leung served as Secretary for Justice from 1997 to
2005; in that capacity she was the principal legal advisor to
the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Government

HONG KONG 00001862 002 OF 002


(HKSARG) and also a member of the Executive Council. Prior
to Hong Kong's reversion to the PRC in 1997, Leung was a
legal advisor to Chief Executive-Designate Tung Chee-Hwa.
During her tenure as Secretary for Justice, Leung was widely
viewed as pro-Beijing and, according to some democrats, as
not particularly sympathetic to their concerns about
maintenance of Hong Kong's high degree of autonomy.
Recently, however, Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal Justice
Kemal Bokhary told poloff that he believed Leung had been an
"unsung heroine" of Hong Kong during her tenure as Secretary
for Justice. Bokhary, who has had decades of professional
interaction with Leung, believed -- admittedly without
concrete evidence -- that Leung had "talked them (the PRC
Government) out of gross excesses" with regard to Hong Kong
policy on multiple occasions. Somewhat similarly, on May 4,
Lee Cheuk-yan, the pro-democratic Legislative Councilor from
the Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions, told poloff that
while Leung was pro-Beijing and would not "fight for the
values of democracy," he nevertheless believed she was honest
and "not a bad guy."

Article 23 Security Legislation
--------------


6. (C) Coincidentally, Leung's visit will take place as the
long-dormant debate over Article 23 of Hong Kong's Basic Law
may be reappearing (septel). On April 27, Professor Wang
Zhenmin, a PRC member of the BLC and Deputy Dean of the
Tsinghua University Law School in Beijing, publicly asserted

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that enactment of Article 23 legislation was one of six
prerequisites for establishment of universal suffrage and
full democracy in Hong Kong (ref). That provision of the
Basic Law requires, without specification of a timetable, the
HKSARG to "enact laws on its own to prohibit any act of
treason, secession, sedition, subversion against the Central
People's Government." In 2002-2004, during Leung's tenure as
Secretary for Justice, the Article 23 legislation was

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politically by far the most contentious issue in Hong Kong,
and public resistance to the legislation contributed to the
high public disapproval ratings and eventual resignation of
then-Chief Executive Tung Chee-Hwa.
Cunningham