Hong Kong

Abstract

HISTORY. Hong Kong island and the southern tip of the Kowloon peninsula were ceded by China to Britain after the first and second Anglo-Chinese Wars by the Treaty of Nanking 1842 and the Convention of Peking 1860. The New Territories were leased to Britain for 99 years by China in 1898. Talks began in Sept. 1982 between Britain and China over the future of Hong Kong after the lease expiry in 1997. On 19 Dec. 1984, the 2 countries signed the Joint Declaration of the British and Chinese Governments on the Question of Hong Kong which entered into force on 27 May 1985. By the terms of this Hong Kong is to become, with effect from 1 July 1997, a Special Administrative Region of the People’s Republic of China enjoying a high degree of autonomy, and vested with executive legislative and independent judicial power, including that of final adjudication. The laws currently in force in Hong Kong are to remain basically unchanged. The existing social and economic systems, and the present life-style, are to remain unchanged for another 50 years. This ‘one country, two systems’ principle, embodied in the Basic Law, which was enacted by the National People’s Congress of the People’s Republic of China in 1990, is to become the constitution for the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. In June 1991 the Legislative Council approved a Bill of Rights. China (People’s Republic) objected to it.