Hong Kong political party Business and Professionals Alliance for Hong Kong (BPA) has proposed 10 measures for the special administrative region to develop a design blueprint capable of ensuring the city becomes a global mediation hub.
Measures include hosting a global mediation summit in Hong Kong, accelerating the establishment of the Hong Kong International Commercial Court, and upgrading mediation services to cover emerging and high-end industries. The BPA recommends that the SAR invite authoritative international organizations to settle in the city and strives to become the location for a branch of the United Nations.
“Upgrading the status of Hong Kong from an arbitration stronghold to a comprehensive international legal hub integrating “litigation + arbitration + mediation” will attract a large amount of business to Hong Kong,” said Jimmy Ng Wing-ka, the party leader and a lawmaker representing the Industrial (Second) functional constituency.
Ng said the SAR should expedite the establishment of the Hong Kong International Commercial Court, allow overseas lawyers to represent clients in specific commercial proceedings, and actively recruit current or retired judges from common law jurisdictions to participate in adjudication, thereby enhancing the international business community’s confidence in the rule of law in Hong Kong.
The Judiciary in May announced its plan to establish the Hong Kong International Commercial Court, a specialist division of the High Court, within a year to adjudicate complex, high-value international and cross-boundary commercial disputes. The International Organization for Mediation set up last year has successfully mediated its first international maritime dispute.
“Given the complex international trade and investment environment, and the lack of a unified dispute resolution mechanism within the Belt and Road countries, Hong Kong’s development as a global mediation center will serve as a primary venue for establishing an arbitration and mediation resolution mechanism for the Belt and Road Initiative,” said Priscilla Leung Mei-fun, vice-chairman and lawmaker representing the BPA in the Election Committee constituency.
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This mechanism aims to resolve disputes through equal consultation based on fairness and inclusiveness, thereby promoting win-win cooperation within the Belt and Road Initiative and generating greater demand for Hong Kong’s professional services in legal, trade, finance, and logistics, she added.
Sunny Tan, vice-chairman and a BPA lawmaker in the Textiles and Garment functional constituency, said the government should vigorously expand the SAR’s international mediation network, promote pilot projects for cross-border enforcement of commercial settlement agreements in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, and build a sustainable “mediation ecosystem”.
Under the Foreign Judgments (Reciprocal Enforcement) Ordinance, Hong Kong currently only has direct registration enforcement arrangements with Australia, India, Malaysia, Singapore, France, Germany, and Italy while most of the ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) countries, the Middle East, Japan, and South Korea are not included.
“ASEAN is Hong Kong’s second-largest trading partner, the Middle East, particularly the six Gulf states, is a key node in the Belt and Road Initiative, and Japan and South Korea are major economies in the region. The lack of enforceability of the judgment will directly weaken the local business community’s willingness to choose Hong Kong as the venue for dispute resolution,” Tan said.
The BPA also advised the administration to accelerate the completion of a revision of the Arbitration Regulations by clarifying the synergy and complementarity among litigation, arbitration, and mediation; and expand the scope of professional mediation services into emerging and high-end fields such as commodity trading, intellectual property, digital finance, biomedicine, and artificial intelligence.
