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The End of WWII
As WWII has just ended, Hong Kong's is at the brink of an economic collapse. Many people struggled to find any necessities to support their daily lives. -
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Chinese Refugees
Many Chinese citizens has immigrated to Hong Kong due to the rise of a civil war, caused by the Communist regime. Originally, the mainland Chinese population was around 600,000, but after the movement, it increased to over 2.1 million. -
Peak of Mainland Chinese Refugees
There were approximately 100,000 mainland Chinese refugees who sought for asylum every month in Hong Kong. -
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Hong Kong's Cultural Identity
When Hong Kong had to deal with a huge number of people immigrating from China, they faced the issue of losing their cultural identity as the foreigner's population largely overweighs the locals. At the beginning of the 1950-60s, illegal immigrants are empathised by government, many were accepted into Hong Kong. But as time goes by, more restrictions are added. For the 1970s, they aimed to strike a balance between control and inclusion, but 1980s resulted in full control and abolishment. -
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Chinese Civil War
There was a dispute within China over the political parties, the nationalists Kuomintang and Mao's party of communists. Many has fleet to Hong Kong in order to improving living conditions such as dodging the risk of execution and preventing starvation. Many of them were so desperate that they are willing to swim 4km across the Dapeng and Shenzhen Bays under very poor conditions just to get to Hong Kong, gambling their lives and safety. -
The 1951 Refugee Convention
This document is established in 1951, its goal is to "define the term ‘refugee’ and outline the rights of the displaced, as well as the legal obligations of States to protect them." - UNHCR official statement There are a total of 145 State parties which has signed this agreement. -
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Vietnamese War
Many people were forced to fleet from Vietnam as their lives are at stake. It is recorded by the UNHCR that over 800,000 Vietnamese had fled by boat and over three million locals, Laotians and Cambodians had fled the area over the span of two decades. -
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A New Start
Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, many refugees contributed into rebuilding Hong Kong's economy by becoming labourer workers. They became one of the reasons that Hong Kong was able to prosper financially, responsible for Hong Kong’s economic success. It also became one of the most dense cities in the world, with a whopping 3.1 million as population during 1960s and 4 million during the 1970s. -
Vietnam Refugees Influx
By the mid-1970s, the Vietnamese war forced many locals to seek refuge in Hong Kong. Over 200,000 of them travelled by boat and a majority of them were left in detention centres while waiting an appeal. There were only around 1,400 who were approved to stay in the city, with 143,700 resettled to other countries and 67,000 were deported back to Vietnam. -
New System for Refugees
The old set of laws were relatively lenient, therefore it was overthrown. The new system introduced in Hong Kong, which allows them to not sign the 1951 United Nations Refugee Convention. This removes a safety net for refugees and their human rights. Currently, Hong Kong is one of the rare cases of a financially sustainable city with developed jurisdiction to not sign the convention. Other countries who refused to sign include India, Somalia, Pakistan, Malaysia, Indonesia etc. -
Pushed Away from Hong Kong
By 2000, as much as 143,700 Vietnamese refugees were forced to resettle in another country and 67,000 of them were sent back to Vietnam. -
Asylum Seekers Restrictions in Hong Kong
A law has been established that it is illegal for asylum seekers to have a job or have the education in Hong Kong if their status has not been approved. Government support is minimal, with a CSSA (Comprehensive Social Security Assistance) plan of having around 3,000 per month for all expenditures. -
New Law and its Butterfly Effect
By the beginning of 2004, the Hong Kong courts has settled on a new law which prohibits the immigration authorities within Hong Kong to deport illegal immigrants if the individuals claims that they are at risk of torture and needed approval of their claims. This caused a drastic increase in the number of asylum seekers and torture claims after this year. -
Seeking for Asylum in Hong Kong
The government has settled on a law which states Hong Kong is unwilling to resettle refugees. This has not stopped numerous Pakistanis, Indians and Bangladeshis from going overseas to Hong Kong to seek for asylums, over 14,000 just this year, but only a mere 103 refugees has ever been accepted of their asylum claims since 2009. -
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Syrian Civil War
A conflict has risen between president Bashar al-Assad against pro-democracy protesters within the country. By 2012, this conflict has escalated into a fully fledged war between two sides of Shia and Sunni, two variants of the Muslim religion. Many were forced to get fleet the country for safety to other countries on a global scale. The war is still on-going till this day. -
Hong Kong's Xenophobic Tendencies
After the large influx of refugees in the recent years, refugees has been associated with two major issues which leaves an extremely negative remark upon the general public of Hong Kong, encouraged xenophobic tendencies by government and media coverage. Firstly, media reports closely associate the word "refugee" and "crime", with a 880% increase within 2015 to 2016. Secondly, there has been some controversy about how refugees are used to buy votes to issue different government parties. -
First Recognised Syrian Refugee
Arriving in Hong Kong during 2016, it over a year for their asylum seeking request to be approved. Their identity has been kept hidden for security reasons but this gives hope to other displaced people in the Middle East as Hong Kong has one of the lowest acceptance rate of refugees globally. Europe is at around 60%, and the global average is at 30%. Currently, there are only 72 recognised asylum seekers within Hong Kong from 2009 to 2016, screenings might take several years to be approved. -
Present Day Hong Kong
Hong Kong is still culturally diverse, within a decade, there was a 41% increase in foreign nationals, excluding Mainland Chinese. It has reached a grand total of over 568,000 by 2016, 7% of the total population. -
First Legally Employed Refugee
Polly McGovern is the first recognised refugee in Hong Kong to obtain a job, he now works for Christian Action's centre for refugees. He came from Eastern Africa and it has not been easy for him as he had to part ways with his family for over 12 years. Quoting him, "It's very depressing and it was a really sad moment when I realised I had to leave them behind." -
Issue of Illegal Immigrants
Illegally immigrating to a country is still an issue that mankind faces in the societies nowadays. But in Hong Kong, there has been a decrease in these cases as time goes by. Back in 2015, there were over 300 recorded cases each month, yet throughout January to November of 2017, there were only 837 cases of non-Chinese illegal immigrants recorded. As for illegal immigrants from mainland China, there were 783 cases in 2015 but only 465 in 2016, with a 41% decrease. -
Failed Cases
In September 2017, there are around 14,000 pending or failed asylum seekers and torture claimants applications. They are mostly from South Asia, that fled from their country due to war. Awaiting process, appeals, adjudication, or deportation after failure to gain refugee status in other countries.
