The Minister of Justice, Ms He Rong, led a delegation to visit Hong Kong on July 17 and met respectively with the Chief Executive, Mr John Lee, and the Secretary for Justice, Mr Paul Lam, SC, a Government spokesman said today (July 19).
Mr Lee welcomed Ms He's visit to Hong Kong, and thanked the Ministry of Justice for its continuous support to the work of the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, as well as its promotion of co-operation of the legal profession from the Mainland and Hong Kong. Mr Lee said that the efforts could facilitate the local legal sector's further integration into national development, contributing to the country's high-quality development. The two sides also exchanged views on such areas as deepening co-operation on legal services among Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macao, and cultivating legal talent.
During the meeting, Mr Lam and Ms He signed a record of meeting for further deepening exchanges and co-operation on talent nurturing and legal and dispute resolution services between the Mainland and Hong Kong.
The key features of the record of meeting include:
(1) Establishing and enhancing the two-way mechanism on nurturing legal talent in the Mainland and Hong Kong, to continue and deepen the implementation of the Framework Arrangement on Legal Talent Exchanges and Training Cooperation between the Ministry of Justice and the Department of Justice of the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, and to jointly explore different forms of co-operation on nurturing legal talent;
(2) Enhancing the support for the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area (GBA) lawyers and Hong Kong resident lawyers practising in the Mainland, and exploring the expansion of the scope of practice of GBA lawyers and Hong Kong resident lawyers who have obtained Mainland practice qualifications; and
(3) Promoting exchanges and co-operation on international commercial arbitration and mediation, as well as supporting the establishment of the co-operation mechanism for dispute resolution institutions in the GBA.
Mr Lam expressed his gratitude to the Ministry of Justice for its continuous support for the Hong Kong legal profession's development. He said that the signing of the record of meeting would further strengthen the depth and breadth of co-operation between the two sides, and consolidate Hong Kong's strategic positioning as a centre for international legal and dispute resolution services in the Asia-Pacific region under the National 14th Five-Year Plan. Ms He said that the Ministry of Justice would support Hong Kong's legal sector, in a pragmatic way, to provide quality legal services and rule of law safeguards for the GBA development and the steadfast and successful implementation of "one country, two systems".
Ms He also met with different sectors for exchanges during her visit to Hong Kong.
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