Prime Minister Scott Morrison has suspended an extradition agreement with Hong Kong.
Sydney:
Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced measures to help Hong Kong citizens start a new life in Australia on Thursday, including extending visas for five years after Beijing imposed a new security law at the Asian financial center. .
Morrison also suspended an extradition agreement with Hong Kong. Under security law, suspects in Hong Kong can be brought for trial in Communist Party-controlled courts in mainland China.
Morrison said the new national security law introduced last week in Hong Kong was a fundamental change of circumstances and that Australia would suspend the extradition agreement.
“There will be Hong Kong citizens who may be looking to move elsewhere, start a new life elsewhere, take their skills, take their business,” said Morrison.
He announced visa measures that would help Hong Kong citizens already in Australia to stay. Hong Kong students graduating in Australia will have the opportunity to stay for five years and apply for permanent residence after this period.
Hong Kong citizens on a temporary work visa to Australia would also be eligible to extend this period by five years and then apply for permanent residence.
Morrison said that there are 10,000 Hong Kong citizens in Australia on student visas or temporary work visas.
Australia also argued that international financial services, consultancy and media companies headquartered in Hong Kong should move to Australia, and said it would offer incentives and visa packages to relocate staff .
“We want them to turn to Australia to settle,” said Acting Immigration Minister Alan Tudge.
Australia has changed its travel advice for Hong Kong, where about 100,000 Australians live and work, to say “reconsider your need to stay in Hong Kong” if they are concerned about the new law.
Travel advice for Hong Kong warns Australians “may be at increased risk of detention on vague national security grounds”.
Hong Kong’s new security law punishes acts of secession, subversion, terrorism and collusion with foreign forces that can go as far as life imprisonment.
The new law has pushed China’s freest city on a more authoritarian path and has attracted condemnation from some Western governments, lawyers and rights groups.
Last week, Canada announced that it would suspend its extradition treaty with Hong Kong in the wake of security legislation and could boost immigration from the former British colony.
Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne held an overnight teleconference with counterparts in the Five Eyes security agreement, which includes the United Kingdom, the United States, New Zealand and Canada, on Hong Kong and the new security law, Payne and British Foreign Minister Dominic Raab said on Twitter.
(With the exception of the title, this story was not edited by GalacticGaming staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
