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the applicant in its judgment of 17 November 1989, criticised the applicant's conduct of his application which had contained baseless allegations of the most serious kind against all parties. It held that the existence of a valid warrant in Hong Kong was not a requirement under United Kingdom law for the issue of the provisional warrant for the applicant's arrest, the latter warrant being an emergency measure. A valid warrant is, however, a requirement for an authority to proceed, but by the time the Secretary of State had sent the Magistrate the authority to proceed on 24 January 1986, a second warrant covering 29 charges had been issued on 20 January 1986 by a Hong Kong court.
Applications for leave to appeal to the House of Lords were again refused, by the Divisional Court on 5 December 1989 and by the House of Lords on 1 February 1990.
d) Habeas corpus 4
On 5 February 1990 the applicant filed a fourth application for a writ of habeas corpus on the basis, inter alia, that the accusations against him were not made in good faith or in the interests of justice and that, by reason of the passage of time, it would be unjust and oppressive to return him to Hong Kong. The parties to the proceedings were the applicant, the Governor of Brixton Prison, the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (until 14 November 1990) and the Hong Kong Government. An issue raised by the respondents was whether this fourth habeas corpus application was an abuse of process of the court, contrary to section 14 (2) of the Administration of Justice Act 1960. A hearing was set for 11 June 1990 after discussions between the applicant's representatives and the Hong Kong Government about the availability of counsel.
In the interim the applicant sought through Hong Kong courts to obtain documentation from the Attorney General of Hong Kong. The Hong Kong Government submitted that the proper forum for such an application was the Divisional Court in the United Kingdom, which was seized of the application for habeas corpus. Accordingly, on 4 April 1990, on the applicant's application, the proceedings in Hong Kong were adjourned generally. On 10 April 1990 he applied to the Divisional Court in the United Kingdom for a discovery order seeking the same documents that he had sought in Hong Kong. This application was listed as a preliminary matter to the habeas corpus proceedings. Subsequently it was decided to deal with this matter separately on 19 June 1990, the application for habeas corpus being put back to October 1990 to allow sufficient court time. The discovery application was heard in the Divisional Court on 19 June 1990 and refused on 20 June 1990, leave to appeal to the House of Lords also being refused and the hearing for the habeas corpus application being fixed for 12 November 1990. The House of Lords itself refused leave to appeal against the discovery refusal on 26 July 1990.
In October 1990 it was estimated that the hearing time for the habeas corpus application would have to be increased from two to three weeks. Various motions were sought by both sides including a motion from the applicant on 7 November 1990 for discovery of the same documents which had already been refused in June 1990. A motion
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