HONG KONG (Reuters) - Hundreds of mainland Chinese have defied deportation orders and rallied in central Hong Kong, vowing they will fight to stay in the former British colony and keep their families from being torn apart. Posted on 04/02/2002 3:31:28 AM PST by Rubber Ducky
HONG KONG (Reuters) - Hundreds of mainland Chinese have defied deportation orders and rallied in central Hong Kong, vowing they will fight to stay in the former British colony and keep their families from being torn apart.
Police watched as the angry protesters marched to Hong Kong's highest court on Tuesday and demanded a meeting with the territory's top judge, but they did not intervene.
Security officials warned some 4,300 illegal immigrants this week that they would be forcibly deported if they did not report for peaceful repatriation to China.
The marchers, defying the governments in Hong Kong and China, shouted slogans and waved banners in front of the courthouse for several hours before moving on to a nearby park. Some said they would rather die than be split from their loved ones in the territory, which returned to China in 1997.
"I'll kill myself if they forcibly repatriate me. At least if I die in Hong Kong, my family can deal with my remains. I have no relative on the mainland," said Wong Mei Yin, 32.
Wong was born in China's southern Fujian province and has been trying for 25 years for a residency permit to join the rest of her family, who long ago won right of abode in Hong Kong.
"The Hong Kong government is not human. Only a beast can tear people from their families!" she cried.
Lin Jiaxiang, whose daughter Yeung Ming is facing deportation, said the 19-year-old will not leave.
"She doesn't want to go, we will fight on," Lin said.
Yeung Ming has been torn from her family once before. When she was just 12, her anguished parents had to choose between staying in Communist China or migrating to Hong Kong without her. Chinese officials had told her parents they could only take one of their twin girls and she was left behind.
Her father thought Beijing would quickly approve a permit for the child, who had no other immediate family in China. But the family waited in vain for official permission, and she decided to stay in the Hong Kong illegally during a visit in 1999.
The Hong Kong government estimates some 1.6 million mainland Chinese could claim right of abode since the 1997 handover and fears they will swamp the tiny territory unless they apply for Chinese exit visas in an orderly manner.
MANY IN HIDING
Many of the illegal immigrants went underground after Sunday midnight, when a deadline for them to leave voluntarily expired.
Immigration officials have begun issuing deportation orders and said the overstayers will be expelled, but they have given no clues on when or how they will round-up the immigrants.
Mainland Chinese officials have warned overstayers in recent weeks to return before April 1 or face punishment.
Most of the illegal immigrants have waited years or decades to join their families in Hong Kong. If they are deported to the mainland, they will have to rejoin long queues in an immigration system they say is arbitrary and riddled with corruption.
Activists supporting the abode seekers said lawyers were on standby to help bail them out and keep them in the territory if they should be detained.
"We hope the Hong Kong government can have a conscience," said Father Franco Mella, who champions the mainlanders' cause.
Ngoh Mei-mun, 45, has been served a deportation order, but she said she will not report to immigration authorities.
"I'm not afraid even to die, I'll just kill myself."
Fearing a flood of immigrants, Hong Kong and Beijing have tried to limit the number of mainlanders moving to the territory.
In 1999, Beijing overturned a ruling by Hong Kong's top court which gave residency rights to any child of a Hong Kong parent. Beijing took the step at the request of the Hong Kong government.
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