This Week in Asian Law

May 1-7

China

  • China promulgated a Food Waste Law that allows restaurants to charge patrons who leave “excessive” amounts of uneaten food, bans vendors from inducing or misleading patrons into ordering excessive amount of food, and bans competitive eating contests and sharing “binge-eating” videos. According to a report (in Chinese) from China’s Academy of Social Sciences, the country wastes about 18 million tons of food each year, enough to feed up to 50 million people for one year.

  • China’s legislature passed the Rural Vitalization Promotion Act that includes wide-ranging measures to train rural talent, support rural industries, and repair or preserve the rural environment. The law also states that farmers should not be relocated against their will and that small villages should not be merged without following proper procedures - both phenomena caused by local governments’ trying to cash in on farmland. The law takes effect June 1.

  • The revised Law on Animal Epidemic Prevention took effect on May 1. Among other things, it requires dog owners to register their animals, get them inoculated against rabies, and keep them leashed when outdoors. The law was first promulgated in 1998 and has gone through four revisions.

  • The People’s Bank of China and China’s securities and banking regulators summoned 13 companies engaged in online finance services, including Tencent (the owner of WeChat), Bytedance (the owner of TikTok), Xiaomi’s fintech arm, e-commerce platform JD.com’s JD Finance, and the finance arm of food delivery platform Meituan, and warned them strengthen anti-monopoly measures and end the “disorderly expansion” of capital.

  • The Supreme People’s Procuratorate released six typical domestic violence cases involving the crimes of abuse, intentional assault, and intentional murder. This is the fifth year of implementing the Domestic Violence Law and these cases reflected the evolving awareness of this problem, the prosecutors explained at the press conference. (in Chinese)

Hong Kong

  • Hong Kong’s Chief Executive Carrie Lam said the government is working on “fake news” legislation to tackle “misinformation, hatred and lies,” as worries grow over media freedoms in Hong Kong. Lam said the government is conducting research but does not have a timetable for the legislation. Radio Free Asia explained the research and the context of Lam’s comments.

  • Hong Kong’s Legislative Council approved the Ordinance on Mainland Judgments in Matrimonial and Family Cases (Reciprocal Recognition and Enforcement) to implement the Agreement on Reciprocal Recognition and Enforcement of Civil Judgments in Matrimonial and Family Cases signed by the Hong Kong government and the Chinese Supreme People’s Court in 2017. Teresa Cheng, Hong Kong’s secretary for justice, explained.

  • Former Hong Kong Chief Justice Geoffrey Ma Tao-li, speaking in a webinar on the future of law and business in Hong Kong, defended the role of foreign judges in the city, arguing they should continue to sit on the bench and help enforce the Basic Law. Ma’s comments appeared intended for Western critics who have urged foreign judges in Hong Kong to quit as a form of protest against the 2020 National Security Law.

  • Joshua Wong, a prominent pro-democracy activist, and three district councilors pleaded guilty to knowingly taking part in an unauthorized assembly last June to commemorate the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown. For years, Hong Kong has been the only place in China where people were allowed to mark the June 4 anniversary, but the government banned the commemoration for the first time in 2020, citing the coronavirus pandemic.

Japan

  • A commission of the lower house of Japan’s parliament voted to revise the National Referendum Law to make it easier to hold a national referendum on amending the Constitution. Japan’s Constitution took effect in 1947 and has never been amended. Currently, any proposed revision needs to be approved by a two-thirds majority in both Diet chambers before it can be put to the public in a national referendum.

  • Japan’s Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga recently raised Japan's greenhouse gas emission reduction target to 46% by 2030, from 26%, in order to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050. Offshore wind farms will become critical to supply renewable green energy. This article analyzed the hurdles Japan needs to overcome.

  • Japan’s Financial Services Agency and Tokyo Stock Exchange will add a provision on human rights to the corporate governance code for publicly traded companies. The change is said to be aimed at helping Japanese corporations face risks related to consumer boycotts and raising capital overseas.

  • Lawyers, asylum seekers, and supporters protested in Osaka against a draft revision to the Immigration Control and Refugee Recognition Act that would limit the number of times foreign nationals can apply for refugee status in Japan. After two attempts, they will be subject to forced deportation. The draft is currently being considered in the Diet.

Koreas

  • South Korea’s newly formed Corruption Investigation Office for High-ranking Officials announced its rules on investigation, including giving itself the power to demand that prosecutors transfer some cases to the special office. The rules triggered a backlash from prosecutors.

  • A subcommittee of South Korea’s National Assembly approved an amendment to the Information and Communications Network Act, mandating the full disclosure of the user names of persons who post or comment on portal sites with an average more than 100,000 daily users. The aim is to curb malicious comments.

  • South Korea’s National Assembly passed the Conflict of Interest Prevention Law, which prohibits public officials from using information related to their job responsibilities for personal gain. Violators may be imprisoned for up to seven years.

  • South Korean police said they have arrested 94 suspects in the past five months alleged to have created or distributed illegal deep fake content. They said that 60-70% of the suspects were teenagers, and 109 of the 114 identified victims were females in their teens or 20s.

Taiwan

  • Taiwan's Legislature ratified a treaty with Belize on Mutual Legal Assistance in Criminal Matters, which will allow them to cooperate on crime prevention and prosecution. Taiwan has mutual legal assistance treaties with six other countries including the United States.

  • Taiwan’s Constitutional Court ruled that most of the restrictions on hunting by indigenous peoples are constitutional, disappointing indigenous rights activists but gladdening conservationists and animal rights groups. However, it also said that some requirements relating to permits and the types of guns that may be used are disproportionate and must be amended within two years. In its Interpretation No. 803, the court said that protecting indigenous culture and protecting wildlife are equally important values which have to be balanced.

  • In a first for international same-sex marriage in Taiwan, the Taipei High Administrative Court ordered a local household registration office to record the marriage of Taiwan citizenTing Tse-yen and his partner Leong Chin-fai, who is from Macau. Taiwan legalized same-sex marriage in 2019, but when one of the couple is not Taiwanese, it has previously recognized the union only if the non-Taiwanese party is also from a jurisdiction that recognizes same-sex marriage.

  • Taiwanese legislators, academics, and others called for the president of the University of Hong Kong (HKU), Zhang Xiang, to be expelled from Taiwan’s prestigious Academia Sinica after HKU cut ties with its student union. Zhang, who was born and received his undergraduate education in mainland China and became president of HKU in 2018, was elected to Academia Sinica’s mathematics and physical sciences division in 2012.

  • Migrant workers and workers’ rights advocates rallied outside the Executive Yuan on International Workers’ Day calling on the government to enact a Household Service Act to protect the labor conditions of migrant domestic workers. The current Labor Standards Act protects migrant workers in factories but not migrant home care workers whose hours are unregulated and who earn less than the minimum wage. The government has previously said that the Household Services Act will undergo an internal review, but this has failed to occur. Another demonstration was held on the same day in Taipei by labor groups demanding better salaries and pensions.

  • A number of recent incidents in Taiwan have given rise to charges of police wrongdoing, the online magazine New Bloom alleges. Among others, it referenced an April 22 incident in which police slammed a woman to the ground and detained her for nine hours purportedly for refusing to produce identification; prosecutors are looking into the case.