After Jimmy Lai Chee-ying, Lee Cheuk-yan and Yeung Sum were charged on Friday with having knowingly participated in an illegal assembly on Aug 31, with Lai also being charged with criminally intimidating a journalist in 2017, their foreign allies erupted in synthetic fury.

As usual, the sinister, UK-based Hong Kong Watch, run by the serial fantasist Benedict Rogers, was first out of the traps. Rogers, whose fake news about the Hong Kong police produced an unprecedented rebuttal from the British Foreign Office in January, called the arrests “outrageous”. However, he primarily relied upon two of his most trusted boot boys, former governor Chris Patten and Hong Kong Watch Patron David Alton, to do his dirty work for him.

Although it appears likely that the comments attributed to the duo were actually drafted for them by Rogers, given the inaccuracies, they must nonetheless take ownership of the fallacies put out in their names.

Whereas Patten claimed that, in arresting the suspects, the Hong Kong government was “twisting the law”, apparently under “instruction from the Communist regime in Beijing”, Alton called on the British government, and others, “to urge the authorities to drop these charges”.

Patten’s implication, therefore, that people of standing or influence should be able to escape their just deserts not only displays a shocking disregard of the rule of law, but also exposes a mindset which is as repugnant to prosecutors in Hong Kong as it is in the UK

As Patten well knows, in Hong Kong, as in the United Kingdom, nobody is above the law. Even if they are prominent and have foreign patrons, suspects must expect to be prosecuted, provided there is sufficient evidence and it is in the public interest. Patten’s implication, therefore, that people of standing or influence should be able to escape their just deserts not only displays a shocking disregard of the rule of law, but also exposes a mindset which is as repugnant to prosecutors in Hong Kong as it is in the UK.

Although Patten, by claiming that they take their orders from Beijing, has shamelessly slandered a fine body of professional prosecutors, he produced no evidence whatsoever, and nor could he. By resorting to this type of calumny, therefore, Patten not only discredits himself, but graphically exposes the true nature of the world of make-believe in which Hong Kong Watch now chooses to operate.

Under the Basic Law (Article 63), moreover, the Department of Justice controls criminal prosecutions “free from any interference”. It exercises its prosecutorial discretion independently, and, as in the UK, the department takes no instructions from anybody. Next time, therefore, that Patten feels tempted to get into the sewer and start flinging filth at honest prosecutors, he should consider brushing up first on the Basic Law. If he does that, he may not be any wiser, but he might at least be better informed.

Although, in terms of Sinophobia, Alton is clearly no match for Patten, he compensates for this with a naivete which makes him invaluable for Rogers. As an obscure member of Britain’s House of Lords, he appeared in Hong Kong during the District Council elections in November, describing himself to all and sundry as an “election observer”. Ever since, he has taken it upon himself to regurgitate whatever fake news is fed to him by Hong Kong Watch, which acts as the UK arm of the protest movement.

However, with his latest intervention, Alton has well and truly shot himself in the foot. By trying to persuade the British government, “and others in the international community”, to urge the authorities in Hong Kong “to drop these charges”, he may have committed a crime. By urging others to interfere with cases which are currently before the courts, Alton may be guilty of an incitement to pervert the course of public justice. If it turns out that Rogers put him up to this, that is no defence, and, next time he visits Hong Kong, Alton may be required to assist the police with their inquiries, assuming he is allowed entry.

Hong Kong is blessed with a prosecution service which is independent, just and principled, and it deserves far better than being the butt of false jibes from political pygmies and has-beens in London.

The author is a senior counsel, law professor and criminal justice analyst, and was previously the director of public prosecutions of Hong Kong.

The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.