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H h Island Detention Centre
The Royal Hong Kong Police also manages the High Island Detention Centre and keeps it under very tight control. Crimes and fights among residents are rare, as they were uncommon when these same people were at Erskine Detention Centre, which was closed down after they were transferred to High Island, and on Shek Kwu Chau, a temporary site used occasionally to house asylum seekers. The secure, peaceful atmosphere at High Island though, is most often said to be the product of the Police's strict rules and punishments. Though people are grateful for the security, they must pay a price their personal freedom and sometimes, their dignity.
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In the first months that the camp opened, any asylum seeker who had permission to go from one section of camp to the next would be body searched every time. Guards frisked the men at the gate, while the women went to a separate room and stripped down for a female guard in plastic gloves to frisk. Though that practice, which many found degrading, has stopped this year, people coming back from hospitals and other trips continue to be searched and have their belongings confiscated. These confiscated items include dry noodles, slippers, seasoning, clothes, candies, and/or anything they did not have before they left High Island.
Because camp authorities consider anything with metal parts a potential weapon, many items that serve basic needs are prohibited, causing frustration for asylum seekers. Examples of prohibited items include: umbrellas, water pails, nail clippers and sewing needles. This writer has often felt a sense of shame and frustration from the detainees as they use a filed down plastic ruler to cut an apple to serve their guest, or as they use some other crude, makeshift tool.
To ensure order, the Police have resorted to the extreme in their reactions to misconduct. Here are some examples:
1.
One woman received a harsh scolding for cutting in the food line. Although nobody likes cutting since all have to stand under the hot sun for a long time, other detainees felt bad and tried to hide her from the policeman. However, he saw her after she got her food and was making her way home. He yelled out for her to stop, then came over and dumped the bowl of food on her head.
2. One day, asylum seekers who work as food distributors told people to wait for bread and not take rice because it had not been properly cooked. The Police made them kneel by the fence as punishment - for inciting a "form of protest."
3. The camp cleaners have also been forced to kneel outside for requesting a raise and threatening to strike. (They make about 80 HK Dollars, 10-11 US Dollars, a month.)
4. A man urinated outside of the toilet and the Police made