the lack of flexibility in the number of foreign judges who can be invited to sit. (A maximum of one out of five is
permitted).
7. The Chinese have made it clear there is no prospect of
altering the agreement reached. The choice is therefore between a Court established on the basis agreed or no CFA
before 1997, with uncertainty thereafter. We believe that the
agreement is compatible with the Joint Declaration and that, faced with this choice, it is preferable to have a CFA set up soon, so that it can gain experience and be well established before 1997. But this will depend on whether the Hong Kong Legislative Council passes the draft legislation which the Hong Kong Government will present to it in due course.
Bill of Rights
8. The Hong Kong Bill of Rights Ordinance became law in
June 1991. The Bill incorporates into local law the relevant
provisions of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights as applied to Hong Kong. Anyone who believes their rights under the Covenant have been infringed is now
able to seek redress in the local courts. Both the Joint
Declaration and Article 39 of the Basic Law provide for the
continued application of the Covenant to Hong Kong after 1997.
Democracy
9.
When the Sino-British Joint Declaration was signed in
1984, there were no elected members of Hong Kong's Legislative Council (LegCo). In 1985 indirect elections for just under half the membership were introduced and, in February 1988, after an extensive consultation exercise, the Hong Kong
Government announced that 10 directly-elected seats would be
introduced in the 1991 LegCo elections. But after the events
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