March 20-26

China

The percentage of women among China’s lawyers is growing, according to the Xinhua News Service. A report about a women’s rights protection center operated by the Lanzhou Women's Federation said that about 60% of the new lawyers who registered in Gansu Province in 2021 were women, as are 36.5% of lawyers overall in the province. Nationwide, 37.2% of registered lawyers in 2019 were women, up from 24.1% in 2010, according to Ministry of Justice data.
The Sichuan High Court has upheld the death penalty for Tang Lu for murdering his ex-wife, the popular Chinese social media influencer Lamu. Tang doused Lamu with gasoline and set her on fire in September 2020 as she was livestreaming, drawing renewed attention to the problem of domestic violence. Tang was convicted and sentenced to death by a lower court in October 2021. A 2020 study (in Chinese) found that among 500 homicide cases researchers sampled in China, about 70% of women were killed by their intimate partners, including current or former spouses or boyfriends, and 11% were killed by other family members.

Shen Deyong, a retired vice president of China's Supreme People’s Court (SPC), is under investigation for alleged serious violations of China’s Communist Party disciplinary rules and laws, according to the party’s Central Commission for Discipline Inspection and State Supervision Commission. Shen is the third SPC vice president to be targeted by the disciplinary agencies in recent years. Huang Songyou and Xi Xiaoming were both sitting SPC vice presidents when they were investigated, stripped of their positions, and convicted of taking bribes.
The Ministry of Justice released its draft Regulations on Procedures for Handling Legal Aid Cases (in Chinese) for public comment. Article 28 of the draft clarifies that it is up to the defendant to decide whether or not to accept a legal aid lawyer. Cases have been reported of defendants in politically sensitive cases being coerced into accepting representation by legal aid lawyers, replacing lawyers hired for them by their families. The deadline to submit comments to the ministry is April 21, 2022.

Hong Kong police fined three people HK$5,000 each for violating Covid restrictions when they staged a pro-Ukraine demonstration in Central on March 24. Police said they had exceeded the two-person cap on gatherings. Others have staged similar pro-Ukraine demonstrations in Hong Kong, holding signs and flags, but done so solo or in twos.

The Tokyo District Court dismissed a suit filed by five people who sought to hold North Korea responsible for abuses they allegedly suffered after moving to North Korea during the period 1960-1972 as part of an official repatriation program. The plaintiffs were ethnic Koreans and Japanese who subsequently managed to flee North Korea. They said they had been lured there by deception. The court said their claim was time-barred and did not comment on the legality of the repatriation program, in which the Japanese government also was involved.

South Korea's Ministry of Government Legislation is operating a new website called the World Laws Information Center to provide the original texts of laws and regulations of international organizations and 55 major countries that have close relations with Korea. These contents are available in 11 foreign languages, including Arabic, Vietnamese, Malay, Thai, English and Chinese. This center’s “personalized legal information service” provides the foreign legal information within five days upon a user’s request.

Legislators unanimously approved amending the constitution to lower the voting age in Taiwan from 20 to 18, making it the first proposed revision to the Constitution to clear the legislature since 2005. The proposed amendment must be voted on in a national referendum and be supported by at least half of all eligible voters to come into effect.
A group of Taiwan legislators proposed amending the Laws and Regulations Regarding Hong Kong & Macau Affairs (香港澳門關係條例) to crack down on Chinese-funded enterprises using deception to hire Taiwanese employees. Investigators said that since 2020, they have discovered 33 cases of Chinese-funded companies hiding their mainland connection in order to hire Taiwanese in violation of the law.