The Surveillance State limited by acts of courage and conscience
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Tibbo, Robert
An update on the circumstances of the Snowden Refugees will be provided at the 35C3 event and venue in December 2018.
 So we're going to start up with a movie, short movie, one minute. And... peu dille So, I'm very happy and I'm asking you for a big applause. The title of the talk is, Survey in State, Limited by Acts of Courage. And here is our speaker, Robert Thibault, and I'm asking to applaud now. Thanks. Thanks very much. Well, thank you. Thank you to Robert Thibault. Well, thank you. Thank you to the Computer Chaos Congress for inviting me here again this year. And thank you for everybody for showing up and for your support for Mr. Snowden and the Snowden Refugees. What I'm going to do is this year I have a PowerPoint, as in past years, a PowerPoint presentation, but with a lot more slides. There's going to be a fair amount of information I'm going to disclose today. So if there'll be a certain part of it that's a bit technical, but once we get through that, then I'll go to the big points on what's happened to my clients over the last year. So I'll start with the presentation. All right. Now, as you're all aware, Mr. Snowden was in Hong Kong 2013, and that's where he made his disclosures about the NSA, egregious illegal and criminal conduct of basically using electronic mass surveillance to spy on pretty much every country in the world. And he's currently in exile in Russia, as we all know. And here are the Snowden Refugees. And I'll just introduce them in case not everybody's familiar. But on the left is Vanessa. She's from the Philippines. And her left is Ajith from Sri Lanka, a former soldier. And to Ajith's left is Nadika from Sri Lanka and her partner, Supun. So Nadika and Supun have two children. The little boy, Dinaf, was actually born in 2016. So he has not had the chance to meet Mr. Snowden yet. And the little girl at the foot of Nadika, that's Settumdi. And then beside her is Kiana. Kiana's the daughter of Vanessa on the far left-hand side. As for myself, since last year, basically systematic efforts by the Hong Kong government from the immigration department to legal aid to the police. There are parallel efforts, basically to put pressure on me. And I'll go into detail on exactly what happened. But the Hong Kong police were basically arresting several witnesses that were testifying for the Snowden refugees. And the police were putting it to course, attempting to course these witnesses and some of them were my clients to make a case, a criminal case against me. And it was at the point that the Hong Kong police attended my former residence in Hong Kong looking for me, seven police officers, but I realized I needed to reach out and get help. And it was time for me to leave Hong Kong. So I received assistance from the Canadian government, advice and assistance. And also lawyers without borders Canada, whom I'm very grateful to. I left on the 30th of November 2017 and I'm not able to enter into Hong Kong. Now what had happened was the immigration department from late 2016 to right up to the end of 2017, early 2018 had basically used different tactics to overwhelm me with work to make it administratively possible for me to do my job. When that didn't work, the immigration department had actually made applications to the duty lawyer service, to the Hong Kong bar association and to the torture claim appeal board, basically seeking to have me removed from acting for the Snowden refugees and their appeals. The legal aid department basically has stopped paying me my fees and those fees go back to 2012 and the duty lawyer service has paid only a small fraction of my fees and have delayed payment over years. The torture claim appeal board fast tracked the Snowden refugee cases, usually in Hong Kong when an appeal is filed. Just bear with me a second. When an appeal is filed, it usually takes about a year or more before an appeal is actually brought up to be heard. But in the Snowden refugees case in 2017, it only took three weeks before the cases were called up, only the Snowden refugee cases. Now what had happened in, this was unknown to us, unknown to me till August 2017, but the Hong Kong police, they had been investigating the Sri Lankan police incursion into Hong Kong, targeting my clients. But in fact, what they were doing is they were investigating the witnesses for the Snowden refugees and the Snowden refugees and myself. And in August last year, one of the key witnesses to the Sri Lankan police coming to Hong Kong, looking for the Snowden refugees, he was arrested by the police, he was denied a lawyer, and actually I'm his lawyer, and the Hong Kong police denied access to how, let me have access to my client. And as I mentioned earlier, the police were at my house actually searching for me. Now what's happened in Hong Kong, and what's happening in many democracies around the world, our governments are becoming increasingly authoritarian. And governments seek to obtain information, private data on civilians. But at the same time, these governments, government departments, don't want to disclose anything. So as part of this presentation, I'm going to be disclosing, you know, the identities of certain people as part of making Hong Kong a little more transparent. But it's these two police officers, Breaker Low and Ms. Yong Wan-Wing, these are the two officers that arbitrarily arrested and arbitrarily detained the witnesses to the Snowden refugee cases. And these are the officers who made systematic attempts to coerce a number of witnesses to testify against me. From what I understand, they were asking my clients to say that I made up the story about the Sri Lankan police coming into Hong Kong. And my clients told the truth that I never said any such things to them. And in fact, they explained they're the ones who were the witnesses and informed me. Now just to give you a wider context, this is Mark Andres Sige. He's the lead Canadian lawyer for the Montreal legal team, which is handling the refugee claims by the Snowden refugees in Ottawa, Canada. And in February 2018, Mr. Sige was in Hong Kong. And as he was leaving Hong Kong at the airport, there were seven police officers waiting for him as he boarded the aircraft. And this was clearly an act of harassment and intimidation. But the Hong Kong government, the Hong Kong police force made it clear they wanted to send a message to Mr. Sige. Mr. Sige went back to Hong Kong in July 2018. And he went directly from the airport to see one of the Snowden refugee families. And they went to a public area that was actually at the top of a building where you wouldn't expect anyone. And it turns out two plainclothes police officers had followed and basically had Mr. Sige under surveillance and followed him right to the roof. So Mr. Sige was in Hong Kong both times to meet with the Snowden refugees. So you have a situation where the lawyers are being attacked, they're being harassed by the Hong Kong authorities. And I'm going to be going through other departments that have been part of this systematic harassment on myself and the other lawyers. But at the end of the day, to attack lawyers who are simply doing their job, acting without fear or favor, is really an attack on the Snowden refugees. And it sends a message that it's an attack on any vulnerable person that's entitled to legal representation. What it is, it's an attack on the core of a rule of law. Now with immigration, they had obstructed me by expediting the Snowden refugee cases at first instance. They had asked the duty lawyer service to remove me from the cases. They did the same thing with the Torture Claim Appeal Board and the Snowden refugees cases are at the appeal stage right now. And the immigration department made a formal complaint to the Hong Kong Bar Association saying that Mr. Thibaut should not be representing these clients because he knows them too well. And I was stunned by this complaint. And what the Hong Kong Bar Association has done is they've grabbed the hold of that complaint with the full intention of proceeding against me in disciplinary proceedings. Ultimately, the goal of immigration is to have me removed as the lawyer for the Snowden refugees or at a minimum prevent me from providing effective legal representation. The legal aid department, after the Snowden film came out in 2016, they completely stopped the majority of my payment due to me for years and it's a significant amount. And at this stage they're not paying me anything. They also struck me off the legal aid list for doing refugee work in the courts. So there's no way for me to ever do work in the courts for refugees unless I do it on a pro bono basis. And completely unrelated to this, I had done a significant amount of work in criminal law in the high court and the legal aid department stopped instructing me for these cases for no reason at all. And this despite under Hong Kong's constitution that anyone who's a criminal defendant or an appellant has a constitutional right to choose their lawyer. That is their absolute right. What this has done is it's put enormous financial stress on myself. It's left me significantly distressed in my ability to practice law and represent my clients. Now the duty lawyer service and I have the administrator Grace Wong and Kenneth Chan is the chief court liaison officer. And these basically are the two key people operating the duty lawyer service. But over the last year or so they've only paid about 24% of my fees and they've systematically delayed payment. And they've removed me from two to three Snowden cases. But what I would say is that I still represent the Snowden refugees but privately through a solicitor who instructs me. And the duty lawyer service systematically stripped most of my clients away from me during this past year. And then in November 2016, just a little over a month ago, the duty lawyer service basically expressed this they didn't trust me, they didn't trust my professional competence. And at that point, despite the clients all trusting me, the actual clients, I was under illegal ethical obligation to resign from all my cases. I had no choice. The Hong Kong Bar Association. The Snowden film was premiered on the 9th of September in 2016 in Toronto, the Toronto International Film Festival. And on the 19th of January 2017, the Hong Kong Bar Association held its annual general meeting where there's an election for new bar chairman and vice-general of the bar. And at that annual general meeting, bar council members raised my identity through my nationality. And accused me of breaching provisions of the bar code for my assistance and my involvement with Mr. Edward Snowden, Snowden refugees. And I had been warned by a fellow barrister who very discreetly warned me that the bar association is looking for a way to cause a lot of trouble for you. And at that point, there had never been any complaints against me by any of my clients. And there were no complaints about from the Snowden refugees, there were no complaints from anyone as far as I knew about the work I'd been doing for the Snowden refugees in Mr. Snowden. So this is going to get a little bit technical if you can bear with me. Less than two months later, I received a letter on the 8th of March and it was a formal complaint by the Standing Committee on Discipline saying that basically accusing me of bringing the bar association into dispute. That I had put the Snowden refugees' lives in danger or I put them in a difficult position. And the second thing was I did all of this to make money for myself, which is ridiculous. The basis of the complaint was an anonymous complaint. The evidence for the complaint, none. It was completely an anonymous complaint. There was no information provided where the anonymous complaint came from, how many people there were, how it was delivered. So between April and May 2017, I wrote to the bar association saying, look, I need to find out more about what this anonymous complaint is. And I asked for disclosure, how it was delivered, if they knew who the complaint was or if there was more than one. Internal communications. What had concerned me was the racist and malicious conduct of the bar association members at the annual general meeting in January that they had chosen to identify me based on my nationality. And they had done so behind my back. In the 8th of March complaint, the bar association listed two pages of questions which were wide in scope and ambiguous. And they had mostly to do with Mr. Snowden. And I realized this was a fishing expedition and they had absolutely no evidence on anything. So I asked for disclosure by the 9th of June. Why the 9th of June of 2017? Because for 12 years, I had a spotless record. I had done nothing wrong at any time. But the Hong Kong bar association decided last year in parallel with the anonymous Snowden complaint to raise a five-year-old complaint where I was accused of being impolite to a prosecutor who failed to disclose evidence in the middle of a criminal trial. This is a trivial complaint that should never be entertained by any bar disciplinary tribunal. And the lawyer representing me was Mr. Grossman at the time, a Queen's counsel. And he communicated to the bar disciplinary tribunal that it was beyond his comprehension why five years after a complaint is made that it should be suddenly prosecuted now. And he described the complaints as a disgrace and trivial rubbish. Those are his words. But at any event, the bar association was in a rush to have this case brought against me. Now, one thing I should explain is with bar disciplinary tribunal proceedings in Hong Kong, I have no insurance to protect me. So whatever the legal costs are of the proceedings, I have to bear them. With duty lawyer, legal aid, not paying me, holding my funds from me, I didn't have enough funds to fight this. Fight something that was so trivial that I've been advised by my lawyer in London, Jeffrey Robertson, who's also Julian Assange's lawyer, and lawyers in Canada and lawyers without borders Canada that no bar association would ever have brought this to disciplinary proceedings. So I admitted the complaints for the simple reason that I couldn't afford the legal risk. I'd be bankrupted if I fought it. And without disclosure from the Hong Kong bar on the Snowden complaint and the racist remarks at the annual general meeting in January 2017, I didn't trust my instincts where I didn't trust that I'd be receiving a fair hearing. In any event, legal costs were awarded against me of over 11,000 euro, which I didn't have, I still don't have. And as for the anonymous complaint, my request for disclosure, it still hadn't been made, which raised a lot of suspicions in my mind. And then shortly after this parallel complaint was decided against me, the bar association finally made some disclosure, but minimal. And then I discovered there were these two complaints, completely anonymous, unsigned, and if you look at the bottom, it says, large group of exasperated barristers. And this was a shock. And if you look at the date, it's the 9th of September, 2016. The bar council, the Standing Committee on Discipline, since the 9th of September, 2016 had concealed in hiddenness from me. In March 8th, 2017, when they brought the formal anonymous complaint against me, the bar association, all they had to do was attach that to the original complaint. But they chose to conceal this, to hide it. What kind of a bar association behaves in such a way? Now looking at the complaints from these two large groups, they say that I allowed myself to be quoted and then have photos taken of me and others. And then they say my clients were put in danger. None of my clients have complained. None of my clients have said, you put me in danger or you put us in danger. I never provided specific details on when the clients were located. Now number two, these persons now will never be able to be resettled in a third country. To remind everybody in Hong Kong, there's a.2% acceptance rate of refugees. My clients had a chance of winning the refugee cases, that's.2%. About 120 cases since 1992 have been accepted out of close to 40,000 refugee claims. So the barist who's wrote this seemed to be completely ignorant of the fact that refugees have pretty much a zero chance of ever succeeding and as such ever being resettled. Now they said this was disgraceful that I should be visiting Mr. Snowden in Moscow as Snowden is an international fugitive on every Interpol stop. That's like telling a heart surgeon, don't go into the operating room because there's going to be blood there. That's like telling a medical doctor, don't treat somebody who's been arrested by the police because they're a bad person. That's telling a criminal lawyer, which I am, don't defend the innocent. Don't defend Mr. Snowden. He's guilty already. That's what the Hong Kong Bar Association is saying. And they said this was all highly damaging to the bar. I ask Philip Dykes, the chairman of the Bar Association. I ask Robert Pang of the Vice Chairman of the Bar Association, what damage has come to the Hong Kong Bar Association because I defended Mr. Snowden, because I defended the Snowden refugees. And one thing I'll say is the Hong Kong Bar about Mr. Snowden and Snowden refugees have said nothing about Mr. Snowden's extraordinary acts of disclosure of criminal conduct. They've said nothing ever, and they've said nothing about the Snowden refugees. They've remained silent. So here's the problem. Two large groups of unknown barristers all deciding to remain anonymous. This could be one barrister, it could be hundreds, it could be thousands. There's a little bit less than 2,000 barristers in Hong Kong. So every single barrister could have been part of these two groups complaining about me for doing my work for Mr. Snowden and the Snowden refugees. And there's no way for me to identify which members of the Bar Association are not part of the large group of exasperated barristers. And I stress again, I wasn't aware of that until August 3rd. If you look at the trivial complaint of me being accused of being rude to a prosecutor, there were two barristers on the Bar Disciplinary Tribunal. How do I know they were not included in the large group of exasperated barristers? So let me put it this way. It's like the police arrest any one of you. Take you into a court, criminal court, and there's a judge sitting in the court. When you say to the judge, I'd like to have disclosure of the evidence against me. And the police says, no, we're not going to show it to you. The prosecution says we're not going to show it to you. And the judge says, we're not going to show it to you. You're found guilty. And then after being found guilty, you find out who complained against you. It was a large group of judges. So this is what's exactly happened in Hong Kong in my case. The people investigating me could be in the large group of barristers. And the people who judged me are also barristers could have been in that group. So what the Hong Kong Bar Association did is they brought themselves into disgrace. They created a procedure that was inherently unfair and potentially biased. If I had known about these complaints, I would have never submitted myself to this jurisdiction and admitted to the facts. I would have ignored it all. So that judgment against me is illegal. And the fine against me, the cost order is void. And the reason for that is the Hong Kong Bar Association's concealment of all of this. Mr. Robertson, Jeffrey Robertson, also a Sanchez lawyer, advised me, and I wrote to the Bar Association that in England, Australia, and Canada, no bar tribunal would act on an anonymous complaint. Absolutely not. Because there's the risk, it's motivated by malice and prejudice. So you have to think about in January 2017, when at the annual general meeting, the Hong Kong Bar Council members pointed me out by my nationality and made remarks against me that there was no evidence for. Robertson advised that it could have come from the CIA or another intelligence agency. And as for disclosure, Robertson, as I know myself, pointed out that to have a fair procedure, the accused has a right to know who the accuser is and has a right to see the evidence before him. The Bar also wanted information on clients, Mr. Snowden and the Snowden refugees, that are privileged and confidential. And there is absolutely no way Mr. Snowden or the Snowden refugees would allow me to disclose that. Nevertheless, the Bar Association continues to proceed against me. So there's three fatal problems with what the Bar Association did. The anonymous complaint, they should not and cannot proceed on it. It came from a large group of barristers who, for all I know, are the same people who are in the Standing Committee on Discipline, the same people in the Bar Council, and the same people in the Bar Discipline Tribunal. And that it's quite clear that the complaint, because it's all about Mr. Snowden, that it's politically motivated, and the targeting of me based on my nationality indicates that it's also malicious. And this is what Mr. Robertson is talking about. Lawyers without borders requested disclosure. Lawyers without borders Canada intervened and requested disclosure from the Bar Association. Bar Association said, no, it's confidential and privileged. How can an anonymous person have that kind of confidentiality and privilege? So the Bar Association is trying to defend unknown people, which makes no sense. Because no confidentiality or privilege exists. So this is again continued concealment by the Hong Kong Bar Association. Now after a year, why was all this happening? But after a year, the Hong Kong Bar Association brought five new complaints against me. What they're doing here is they're trying to grab data, trying to grab intelligence. At the same time, they don't want to disclose anything to me. And they want to prosecute me in these quasi-criminal proceedings. And this is the same thing that big government does. They want to reach out, and they want all the information from everybody, but they don't want to be transparent and be accountable. And as Ed Snowden said in Citizen 4, in the hands of a system whose reach is unlimited, but whose safeguards are not. Now on a higher level, on an overarching level, when you have organizations that are court of rule of law that want information, for example, on Mr. Snowden, detailed information, but at the same time won't even disclose to me as the barister for Mr. Snowden what evidence they have against me to prosecute me. All based on anonymous complaint. This is all about government overreaching its boundaries, and at the same time not wanting to disclose, not wanting to be transparent, not wanting to be accountable. I'd like to mention Robert Pang. Robert Pang is now the spokesperson for the Hong Kong Bar Association on the matters that I've raised publicly about my treatment. Now I'd just highlight he was a bar council member and the chairman on the Standing Committee on Discipline in 2016. Then he continued as the vice chairman of the bar in 2017 and the year after 2018. At the same time, he was also director of the duty lawyer service council. Now Mr. Pang had in his hands the anonymous complaints from the very beginning. He was privy to that information from the very beginning. And he's now the spokesman for the Hong Kong Bar Association. Mr. Pang said recently, oh, we're not relying on the anonymous complaint anymore. We're never relying on it. But the original complaint said anonymous complaint. I asked for disclosure, including the bar minutes, the bar council minutes, for meetings stating that they're not proceeding on the anonymous complaints. That has never been disclosed to me. Then Mr. Pang said there's an identified complainant. For two years I've asked for a disclosure of that. No identification of a complainant. And Mr. Pang, by saying that, after two years saying there's an identified complainant, it's completely unethical to have hidden that from me for two years. But it doesn't matter because there is no identified complainant because Mr. Pang was asked for the identified complainant as identity or her identity and it was never given. So what the bar association did is they brought another five complaints against me for not replying to their demands for disclosure of my information on my clients and my cases. So they're using their powers to punish me for not disclosing. But at the same time I had written to the bar association saying please disclose to me all the evidence you have against me and then I'll take advice from Mr. Robertson, Queens Council and then I'll reply to you. They never disclosed. Instead after a year they brought fresh proceedings against me for not replying, which is a lie. I did reply. I'd like to go back in history a little bit and this goes back to rule of law. Mouth of the lion in Venice in the 14th centuries, what had happened was post boxes of a lion's face were put in and people could put in anonymous complaints, criminal complaints. And by the late 14th century there was the council of ten that would decide who they would prosecute based on anonymous complaints. Almost two centuries later Venice government decided well we have to make sure there are three witnesses. This was a reign of terror. And as Mark Twain had stated that there were the terrible lion's mouths. These were the throats down which went the anonymous accusation thrust and secretly in the dead of night by the enemy that doomed many an innocent man. This kind of behavior is not rule of law. And I'm pointing out to you the way human beings have behaved in history. There's also the existence of the star chambers which existed between the 15th and 18th century in England but today they're basically referred to as a legal administrative bodies which are making strict or arbitrary rulings with secretive proceedings. And John Cameron, Queen's Council in Canada in describing the way the Hong Kong Bar Association is behaving says does this remind you of the star chamber, complainants and adjudicators protected from public accountability in a professional body engaged to protect the public. Governor O'Rourke has written extensively about all that's happened in Hong Kong with myself and my clients but basically how this is an attack by powerful government and the Bar Association really attacking seven vulnerable people who helped Mr. Snowden. And John Cameron, the Queen's Council had said that if an anonymous complaint came to him if he was a Bar Council chairman he'd throw it in the bin. And that's exactly what should have been done in Hong Kong but was not. Manfred Nellich, the former UN Special Rapporteur on torture commented on the Hong Kong Bar Association's behavior and says that current actions against TIPO could only be explained by the fact that probably enormous pressure from outside is exercised. Oliver Stone discussed the Hong Kong Bar Association and the government's treatment saying it was outrageous. Now going to the Snowden refugees at the very bottom Oliver Stone's quoted in the National Post of Canada. He talks about Snowden, I think he helped humanity by pointing out a situation I think is intolerable still. And then he talks about the people who helped them were human beings and in a way it's about human beings against governments. So in summary you've seen the Hong Kong government abusing its powers against seven vulnerable people using disproportionate resources. Canada continually delays knowing very well that it's not safe for the Snowden refugees in Hong Kong and they've done nothing to make a decision. The Sri Lankan government having come into Hong Kong I threatened my clients. So why are these seven, the only seven Snowden refugees on the entire planet, why are they so special to these governments and why has Canada delayed? And in my view this comes down to the Snowden refugees are something, they represent something that every government is afraid of. That they have the moral strength and conscience to do the right thing despite being deprived of everything in Hong Kong, that they don't fear the government and that they're willing to protect whistleblowers and they represent a force of transparency and accountability. And Stone is asking and he was quoted on the 29th of November 2018, why hasn't Canada taken in these people? You know, they'd be an asset. Just last over a week ago Justin Trudeau talked about Canada signing up to the global compact on migration and he says Canadians should be proud of this, that we're showing leadership on one of the important issues around the world which is migrations and immigration. And we're demonstrating that rigorous systems and an open policy actually leads to economic growth and economic advantages in stronger communities. And being able to do this in a way that shows global leadership and of course does not impinge on our own sovereignty is something that Canadians should be proud of. But Trudeau has done nothing. He's not spoken about the Snowden refugees and no decision has been made on their cases. And what we don't understand is through the legal team in Montreal, an NGO is set up and we've raised funds to pay for everything for the Snowden refugees in coming to Canada and living in Canada. So there's no cost to the tax paper. So why has Trudeau, why has the Minister of Immigration and Med Hussain, a former refugee himself who obtained refugee status in Canada, why have they done nothing? Why does Canada continue to tolerate that the people who are asking for protection to be left at risk and fear and deprived of their dignity? Why has Canada not made a decision? Why do they continue to drag their feet? So there's a standoff. Hong Kong doesn't want to decide the cases. Canada doesn't want to decide the cases. I have no doubt if Canada rejects the cases, Hong Kong will reject them. So we have two jurisdictions, two states dancing around the Snowden refugees and forgetting about them. And this is disgraceful. I'll come back to this later, but this has been going on for more than two years now and the clients do need everybody's support. That means financial support. I'll talk about that later. What I'd like to do is to have a short Q&A and then after the Q&A I'm going to proceed to another issue. So if anybody has any questions, I'll take questions for about five minutes. I'm going to get this in half with that. So do we have questions? Can I please listen to the question? Okay, we have a couple of questions here. The first one is as Hong Kong is increasingly under pressure from China, where harassment of human rights laureates is routine. Do you think China is involved in this case? And if so, is it based on pressure from the US or is it professional literacy? The last part I couldn't understand. You talked about China, something about the US. Yes, do you think China is involved in this case? And if so, is it based on pressure from the USA? As Manfred Noah could point out, in his view, it's likely there's a powerful outside force putting pressure on the Hong Kong bar, on the Hong Kong government. One thing I should mention is mainland China is the largest weapons and arms supplier to Sri Lanka. And there's clearly an interest of the mainland Chinese not to have Sri Lanka criticized. The second issue is Beijing and Hong Kong do not want ethnic minorities in their jurisdiction, particularly not refugees. China is ethnocentric in its politics and at the same time Hong Kong is not a multicultural society. So the narrative of the Snowden refugees is not consistent with the narrative of the Hong Kong government. The Hong Kong government is there's no such thing as refugees or asylum seekers. They're all illegal migrants. They've only come in here to take money away from us. As for the United States, I have no doubt that the United States and the other five eyes have an interest in what happens in Hong Kong. And I have no doubt they're putting pressure on Canada. Okay. So do you want to go on with the next question from the internet? Yes. And also, are you surprised about how the other party strikes you so hard during this case? I was surprised that the Hong Kong government were the instigators. The government that's supposed to provide international protection to refugees and asylum seekers, that it was the very party that my clients have put their trust into is the party that's attacked them and their lawyer. And this is disgraceful. And this whole conduct was a surprise in the beginning. But as things progressed, I realized that Hong Kong is not a democracy. It's an authoritarian system where the leaders are the majority of the leaders and the leadership of Hong Kong is appointed by Beijing. So this is a jurisdiction that has had democratic freedoms and constitutional rights steadily eroded over the last couple of years. So now it wasn't a surprise in the end because quite clearly the Hong Kong government has no interest in listening to its society. They have no interest in listening to their wants, needs and concerns. Okay. Thanks. So if I see that right, we have one question over there. No, not really. Okay. Oh, there's another one. Yes, please. Micro number two. Excuse me. Yes. Do you think there's a connection to the Huawei case? The which case? The daughter of the boss of Huawei, the main investor, has been held in Kamala for a very well difficult legal issue. And I think they are playing a very prudently game here. Do you think? It's Huawei. Huawei is the telecom company. Yes, I understand. The treatment of the Snowden refugees is just part and parcel of the discrimination and racism that exists in Hong Kong and in Mainland China against ethnic minorities. And I don't think there's any direct link to the Huawei case. But that's a completely different subject, which I really don't have time to address today. Okay. I think that's also okay. And I don't see any more questions. Oh, there's another one. Hello. So I think that's the last question. Yes, last question. Yeah. Thanks. Micro number one. Thank you for your work. Second, is there, were there any attempts by your colleagues, various colleagues in Hong Kong to maybe also issue a statement of even larger anonymous group? Sorry. Were there any attempts by your colleagues and the Hong Kong Barista Association to also issue a statement or to make a counter complaint and then sign it, you know, larger anonymous group or any, have you received any support from your colleagues? No, absolutely none. No, not the only colleague that was sympathetic and supported me was the person who said, your nationality was raised at the annual general meeting in January 2017. Please be careful. They recognized I had done nothing wrong. That was the only time. Okay. Thanks. It's very hard to, to hear that. And the more I'm happy that you're here. And I think you've got a little surprise for us, right? I do. I'm going to be with somebody who's visiting right now and I'd like to bring them on the person on the screen. Okay. So can we please get, hello, good evening. This is Vanessa, one of the Snowy Revuges. Hi, Vanessa. How are you? I'm okay. I'm a little bit nervous right now. All right. Don't be nervous. Is there anything you want to tell the audience today about your situation in Hong Kong? Yes. Thank you so much for supporting us while we're doing both time. And now our audience is not here in Hong Kong because the Hong Kong bar, the Hong Kong bar, I'm sorry, I'm just a little bit nervous. Vanessa, was it the Hong Kong bar that caused me to leave Hong Kong? Yeah, the Hong Kong bar, sorry, now Mr. Robert Tebow is not here in Hong Kong because the Hong Kong bar, they bring anonymous complaints against Mr. Tebow. And the Hong Kong bar is trying to defy me and other Snowden refugee, Mr. Tebow, of our being a lawyer. And Snowden refugee never complained about Mr. Tebow to the Hong Kong bar. And the Hong Kong bar put me in my daughter at risk and it is a shame to the Hong Kong bar what has done to Mr. Tebow. And the Hong Kong bar, they never help and never care. And Snowden refugee, and just to go... The Prime Minister of Canada, right? Yeah, yes, the Prime Minister of Canada, she talks about helping refugee whites, a typical of Snowden refugee in the world and why is delaying, why is that making decision now. And we are not safe in Hong Kong. We cannot go back to our home country. And I hope they make the decisions now. So stop delaying, make the decisions now. Thank you, Vanessa. Thank you. If I just may step in very shortly, you don't have to thank us. We have to thank you for what you did. Does anyone have any questions for Vanessa? Yeah, do you have questions? You have the chance to ask directly. Don't be shy. Okay. I don't see any questions. You see, they're all excited as well, so everybody is nervous. There's no questions. There's no questions. There's one coming. Okay. Okay, microphone one. Please ask a question. Hello. Yeah. I'd like to know, how's life for refugees in Hong Kong? So do you feel there's any public support for refugees in Hong Kong and how is your quality of living in general? What I'm said for my only interview, I don't ask a refugee or asylum seekers in Hong Kong. I don't get any assistance from the Hong Kong government since 2016 when the Hong Kong government is questioning me about how many days I would put in stay in my house. So I told her that I cannot answer her question, she should contact my lawyer Mr. Robert Tebow. So after that, I can stop my assistance. So I, me and my daughter never get any assistance until now from the Hong Kong government, even my daughter's education, my rent. So it's so hard for me to survive, but I'm very thankful to my lawyer Mr. Robert Tebow and the people who support me in Canada and all over the world who didn't make the donation and make us fundraising for us. So me and my daughter can survive in some southern refugee, but I'm also afraid because we are not safe here in Hong Kong, so it's not easy for me and my daughter and some other southern refugee in Hong Kong. So we are not safe here. In general, it's not easy here in Hong Kong. It's very terrible life here. It's very depressing and I need to be brave and I have to be trust to my lawyer Mr. Robert Tebow and my lawyer Mr. Canada. So I hope soon I can, me and my daughter and the other southern refugees can get into our safe, clean, well-off rhythm. Thank you. Thanks to you. Thank you so much. Okay. Are there more questions? I don't see, oh, there's one coming. If I may go on. Yes. And may I ask you what would happen to you? If you were denied asylum basically. Sorry? What would happen to you if you were denied refugee status in Hong Kong or Canada or both? In both places. What would happen to you Vanessa, if your cases were rejected? In my case, if my case is rejected in Hong Kong or in Canada, I cannot go back to Philippines. I have very high profile right now. So I should, me and my daughter will be called in Philippines. So my life is, there's no point for me and my daughter to survive anywhere. So maybe we'll be killed, maybe my daughter. There's no any future for her. And there's no life waiting for me and my daughter. The only thing is sending back to the Philippines and me and my daughter will be killed. They'll be died. There's nothing for me and my daughter. Thank you. Okay. So. Any other questions? This is the last question. There's a last question, yes. Okay. Microphone please. Hello. Kind of reluctant to asking you this, but I have to do. If you could go back in time and decide again, what would you do? Sorry, can you say it again? If you could go back in time and decide again after knowing what you know now and having been through this, would you do that again? Would you help Snowden again? Would you decide the same again or different? I always say yes. I wanted to help him. And for me what he's doing is the right thing. He's not going to do anything wrong. And I'm not doing anything wrong. I just help him. And for me he's, he's helped. So I help him. And Vanessa, would you do it again? Yes, I will help him again. Thanks. I will do it again. Wow. I have shivers running down my spine by so much humanity and yeah, brave, brave, brave woman. Thank you so much. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Vanessa. You have a good night. Thank you. Okay. Good night everyone. Good night. And best wishes. Thank you. Okay. That's it. That's it. And let me just tell you, if you have some spare money, donate. It's a good cause. Thanks so much. Thank you.
 So we're going to start up with a movie, short movie, one minute.  And...  peu dille  So, I'm very happy and I'm asking you for a big applause.  The title of the talk is, Survey in State, Limited by Acts of Courage.  And here is our speaker, Robert Thibault, and I'm asking to applaud now.  Thanks.  Thanks very much.  Well, thank you.  Thank you to Robert Thibault.  Well, thank you.  Thank you to the Computer Chaos Congress for inviting me here again this year.  And thank you for everybody for showing up and for your support for Mr. Snowden and the  Snowden Refugees.  What I'm going to do is this year I have a PowerPoint, as in past years, a PowerPoint  presentation, but with a lot more slides.  There's going to be a fair amount of information I'm going to disclose today.  So if there'll be a certain part of it that's a bit technical, but once we get through that,  then I'll go to the big points on what's happened to my clients over the last year.  So I'll start with the presentation.  All right.  Now, as you're all aware, Mr. Snowden was in Hong Kong 2013, and that's where he made  his disclosures about the NSA, egregious illegal and criminal conduct of basically using electronic  mass surveillance to spy on pretty much every country in the world.  And he's currently in exile in Russia, as we all know.  And here are the Snowden Refugees.  And I'll just introduce them in case not everybody's familiar.  But on the left is Vanessa.  She's from the Philippines.  And her left is Ajith from Sri Lanka, a former soldier.  And to Ajith's left is Nadika from Sri Lanka and her partner, Supun.  So Nadika and Supun have two children.  The little boy, Dinaf, was actually born in 2016.  So he has not had the chance to meet Mr. Snowden yet.  And the little girl at the foot of Nadika, that's Settumdi.  And then beside her is Kiana.  Kiana's the daughter of Vanessa on the far left-hand side.  As for myself, since last year, basically systematic efforts by the Hong Kong government  from the immigration department to legal aid to the police.  There are parallel efforts, basically to put pressure on me.  And I'll go into detail on exactly what happened.  But the Hong Kong police were basically arresting several witnesses that were testifying for  the Snowden refugees.  And the police were putting it to course, attempting to course these witnesses and some  of them were my clients to make a case, a criminal case against me.  And it was at the point that the Hong Kong police attended my former residence in Hong  Kong looking for me, seven police officers, but I realized I needed to reach out and get  help.  And it was time for me to leave Hong Kong.  So I received assistance from the Canadian government, advice and assistance.  And also lawyers without borders Canada, whom I'm very grateful to.  I left on the 30th of November 2017 and I'm not able to enter into Hong Kong.  Now what had happened was the immigration department from late 2016 to right up to the  end of 2017, early 2018 had basically used different tactics to overwhelm me with work  to make it administratively possible for me to do my job.  When that didn't work, the immigration department had actually made applications to the duty  lawyer service, to the Hong Kong bar association and to the torture claim appeal board, basically  seeking to have me removed from acting for the Snowden refugees and their appeals.  The legal aid department basically has stopped paying me my fees and those fees go back to  2012 and the duty lawyer service has paid only a small fraction of my fees and have  delayed payment over years.  The torture claim appeal board fast tracked the Snowden refugee cases, usually in Hong  Kong when an appeal is filed.  Just bear with me a second.  When an appeal is filed, it usually takes about a year or more before an appeal is actually  brought up to be heard.  But in the Snowden refugees case in 2017, it only took three weeks before the cases  were called up, only the Snowden refugee cases.  Now what had happened in, this was unknown to us, unknown to me till August 2017, but  the Hong Kong police, they had been investigating the Sri Lankan police incursion into Hong  Kong, targeting my clients.  But in fact, what they were doing is they were investigating the witnesses for the Snowden  refugees and the Snowden refugees and myself.  And in August last year, one of the key witnesses to the Sri Lankan police coming to Hong Kong,  looking for the Snowden refugees, he was arrested by the police, he was denied a lawyer, and  actually I'm his lawyer, and the Hong Kong police denied access to how, let me have access  to my client.  And as I mentioned earlier, the police were at my house actually searching for me.  Now what's happened in Hong Kong, and what's happening in many democracies around the  world, our governments are becoming increasingly authoritarian.  And governments seek to obtain information, private data on civilians.  But at the same time, these governments, government departments, don't want to disclose anything.  So as part of this presentation, I'm going to be disclosing, you know, the identities  of certain people as part of making Hong Kong a little more transparent.  But it's these two police officers, Breaker Low and Ms. Yong Wan-Wing, these are the two  officers that arbitrarily arrested and arbitrarily detained the witnesses to the Snowden refugee  cases.  And these are the officers who made systematic attempts to coerce a number of witnesses to  testify against me.  From what I understand, they were asking my clients to say that I made up the story about  the Sri Lankan police coming into Hong Kong.  And my clients told the truth that I never said any such things to them.  And in fact, they explained they're the ones who were the witnesses and informed me.  Now just to give you a wider context, this is Mark Andres Sige.  He's the lead Canadian lawyer for the Montreal legal team, which is handling the refugee  claims by the Snowden refugees in Ottawa, Canada.  And in February 2018, Mr. Sige was in Hong Kong.  And as he was leaving Hong Kong at the airport, there were seven police officers waiting for  him as he boarded the aircraft.  And this was clearly an act of harassment and intimidation.  But the Hong Kong government, the Hong Kong police force made it clear they wanted to  send a message to Mr. Sige.  Mr. Sige went back to Hong Kong in July 2018.  And he went directly from the airport to see one of the Snowden refugee families.  And they went to a public area that was actually at the top of a building where you wouldn't  expect anyone.  And it turns out two plainclothes police officers had followed and basically had Mr. Sige under  surveillance and followed him right to the roof.  So Mr. Sige was in Hong Kong both times to meet with the Snowden refugees.  So you have a situation where the lawyers are being attacked, they're being harassed  by the Hong Kong authorities.  And I'm going to be going through other departments that have been part of this systematic harassment  on myself and the other lawyers.  But at the end of the day, to attack lawyers who are simply doing their job, acting without  fear or favor, is really an attack on the Snowden refugees.  And it sends a message that it's an attack on any vulnerable person that's entitled to  legal representation.  What it is, it's an attack on the core of a rule of law.  Now with immigration, they had obstructed me by expediting the Snowden refugee cases  at first instance.  They had asked the duty lawyer service to remove me from the cases.  They did the same thing with the Torture Claim Appeal Board and the Snowden refugees cases  are at the appeal stage right now.  And the immigration department made a formal complaint to the Hong Kong Bar Association  saying that Mr. Thibaut should not be representing these clients because he knows them too well.  And I was stunned by this complaint.  And what the Hong Kong Bar Association has done is they've grabbed the hold of that complaint  with the full intention of proceeding against me in disciplinary proceedings.  Ultimately, the goal of immigration is to have me removed as the lawyer for the Snowden  refugees or at a minimum prevent me from providing effective legal representation.  The legal aid department, after the Snowden film came out in 2016, they completely stopped  the majority of my payment due to me for years and it's a significant amount.  And at this stage they're not paying me anything.  They also struck me off the legal aid list for doing refugee work in the courts.  So there's no way for me to ever do work in the courts for refugees unless I do it on  a pro bono basis.  And completely unrelated to this, I had done a significant amount of work in criminal law  in the high court and the legal aid department stopped instructing me for these cases for  no reason at all.  And this despite under Hong Kong's constitution that anyone who's a criminal defendant or  an appellant has a constitutional right to choose their lawyer.  That is their absolute right.  What this has done is it's put enormous financial stress on myself.  It's left me significantly distressed in my ability to practice law and represent my clients.  Now the duty lawyer service and I have the administrator Grace Wong and Kenneth Chan  is the chief court liaison officer.  And these basically are the two key people operating the duty lawyer service.  But over the last year or so they've only paid about 24% of my fees and they've systematically  delayed payment.  And they've removed me from two to three Snowden cases.  But what I would say is that I still represent the Snowden refugees but privately through  a solicitor who instructs me.  And the duty lawyer service systematically stripped most of my clients away from me during  this past year.  And then in November 2016, just a little over a month ago, the duty lawyer service basically  expressed this they didn't trust me, they didn't trust my professional competence.  And at that point, despite the clients all trusting me, the actual clients, I was under  illegal ethical obligation to resign from all my cases.  I had no choice.  The Hong Kong Bar Association.  The Snowden film was premiered on the 9th of September in 2016 in Toronto, the Toronto  International Film Festival.  And on the 19th of January 2017, the Hong Kong Bar Association held its annual general meeting  where there's an election for new bar chairman and vice-general of the bar.  And at that annual general meeting, bar council members raised my identity through my nationality.  And accused me of breaching provisions of the bar code for my assistance and my involvement  with Mr. Edward Snowden, Snowden refugees.  And I had been warned by a fellow barrister who very discreetly warned me that the bar  association is looking for a way to cause a lot of trouble for you.  And at that point, there had never been any complaints against me by any of my clients.  And there were no complaints about from the Snowden refugees, there were no complaints  from anyone as far as I knew about the work I'd been doing for the Snowden refugees in  Mr. Snowden.  So this is going to get a little bit technical if you can bear with me.  Less than two months later, I received a letter on the 8th of March and it was a formal complaint  by the Standing Committee on Discipline saying that basically accusing me of bringing the  bar association into dispute.  That I had put the Snowden refugees' lives in danger or I put them in a difficult position.  And the second thing was I did all of this to make money for myself, which is ridiculous.  The basis of the complaint was an anonymous complaint.  The evidence for the complaint, none.  It was completely an anonymous complaint.  There was no information provided where the anonymous complaint came from, how many people  there were, how it was delivered.  So between April and May 2017, I wrote to the bar association saying, look, I need to  find out more about what this anonymous complaint is.  And I asked for disclosure, how it was delivered, if they knew who the complaint was or if there  was more than one.  Internal communications.  What had concerned me was the racist and malicious conduct of the bar association members at  the annual general meeting in January that they had chosen to identify me based on my  nationality.  And they had done so behind my back.  In the 8th of March complaint, the bar association listed two pages of questions which were wide  in scope and ambiguous.  And they had mostly to do with Mr. Snowden.  And I realized this was a fishing expedition and they had absolutely no evidence on anything.  So I asked for disclosure by the 9th of June.  Why the 9th of June of 2017?  Because for 12 years, I had a spotless record.  I had done nothing wrong at any time.  But the Hong Kong bar association decided last year in parallel with the anonymous Snowden  complaint to raise a five-year-old complaint where I was accused of being impolite to a  prosecutor who failed to disclose evidence in the middle of a criminal trial.  This is a trivial complaint that should never be entertained by any bar disciplinary tribunal.  And the lawyer representing me was Mr. Grossman at the time, a Queen's counsel.  And he communicated to the bar disciplinary tribunal that it was beyond his comprehension  why five years after a complaint is made that it should be suddenly prosecuted now.  And he described the complaints as a disgrace and trivial rubbish.  Those are his words.  But at any event, the bar association was in a rush to have this case brought against  me.  Now, one thing I should explain is with bar disciplinary tribunal proceedings in Hong  Kong, I have no insurance to protect me.  So whatever the legal costs are of the proceedings, I have to bear them.  With duty lawyer, legal aid, not paying me, holding my funds from me, I didn't have enough  funds to fight this.  Fight something that was so trivial that I've been advised by my lawyer in London, Jeffrey  Robertson, who's also Julian Assange's lawyer, and lawyers in Canada and lawyers without  borders Canada that no bar association would ever have brought this to disciplinary proceedings.  So I admitted the complaints for the simple reason that I couldn't afford the legal risk.  I'd be bankrupted if I fought it.  And without disclosure from the Hong Kong bar on the Snowden complaint and the racist  remarks at the annual general meeting in January 2017, I didn't trust my instincts where I  didn't trust that I'd be receiving a fair hearing.  In any event, legal costs were awarded against me of over 11,000 euro, which I didn't have,  I still don't have.  And as for the anonymous complaint, my request for disclosure, it still hadn't been made,  which raised a lot of suspicions in my mind.  And then shortly after this parallel complaint was decided against me, the bar association  finally made some disclosure, but minimal.  And then I discovered there were these two complaints, completely anonymous, unsigned,  and if you look at the bottom, it says, large group of exasperated barristers.  And this was a shock.  And if you look at the date, it's the 9th of September, 2016.  The bar council, the Standing Committee on Discipline, since the 9th of September, 2016  had concealed in hiddenness from me.  In March 8th, 2017, when they brought the formal anonymous complaint against me, the  bar association, all they had to do was attach that to the original complaint.  But they chose to conceal this, to hide it.  What kind of a bar association behaves in such a way?  Now looking at the complaints from these two large groups, they say that I allowed myself  to be quoted and then have photos taken of me and others.  And then they say my clients were put in danger.  None of my clients have complained.  None of my clients have said, you put me in danger or you put us in danger.  I never provided specific details on when the clients were located.  Now number two, these persons now will never be able to be resettled in a third country.  To remind everybody in Hong Kong, there's a.2% acceptance rate of refugees.  My clients had a chance of winning the refugee cases, that's.2%.  About 120 cases since 1992 have been accepted out of close to 40,000 refugee claims.  So the barist who's wrote this seemed to be completely ignorant of the fact that refugees  have pretty much a zero chance of ever succeeding and as such ever being resettled.  Now they said this was disgraceful that I should be visiting Mr. Snowden in Moscow as  Snowden is an international fugitive on every Interpol stop.  That's like telling a heart surgeon, don't go into the operating room because there's  going to be blood there.  That's like telling a medical doctor, don't treat somebody who's been arrested by the  police because they're a bad person.  That's telling a criminal lawyer, which I am, don't defend the innocent.  Don't defend Mr. Snowden.  He's guilty already.  That's what the Hong Kong Bar Association is saying.  And they said this was all highly damaging to the bar.  I ask Philip Dykes, the chairman of the Bar Association.  I ask Robert Pang of the Vice Chairman of the Bar Association, what damage has come to the  Hong Kong Bar Association because I defended Mr. Snowden, because I defended the Snowden  refugees.  And one thing I'll say is the Hong Kong Bar about Mr. Snowden and Snowden refugees have  said nothing about Mr. Snowden's extraordinary acts of disclosure of criminal conduct.  They've said nothing ever, and they've said nothing about the Snowden refugees.  They've remained silent.  So here's the problem.  Two large groups of unknown barristers all deciding to remain anonymous.  This could be one barrister, it could be hundreds, it could be thousands.  There's a little bit less than 2,000 barristers in Hong Kong.  So every single barrister could have been part of these two groups complaining about  me for doing my work for Mr. Snowden and the Snowden refugees.  And there's no way for me to identify which members of the Bar Association are not part  of the large group of exasperated barristers.  And I stress again, I wasn't aware of that until August 3rd.  If you look at the trivial complaint of me being accused of being rude to a prosecutor,  there were two barristers on the Bar Disciplinary Tribunal.  How do I know they were not included in the large group of exasperated barristers?  So let me put it this way.  It's like the police arrest any one of you.  Take you into a court, criminal court, and there's a judge sitting in the court.  When you say to the judge, I'd like to have disclosure of the evidence against me.  And the police says, no, we're not going to show it to you.  The prosecution says we're not going to show it to you.  And the judge says, we're not going to show it to you.  You're found guilty.  And then after being found guilty, you find out who complained against you.  It was a large group of judges.  So this is what's exactly happened in Hong Kong in my case.  The people investigating me could be in the large group of barristers.  And the people who judged me are also barristers could have been in that group.  So what the Hong Kong Bar Association did is they brought themselves into disgrace.  They created a procedure that was inherently unfair and potentially biased.  If I had known about these complaints, I would have never submitted myself to this jurisdiction  and admitted to the facts.  I would have ignored it all.  So that judgment against me is illegal.  And the fine against me, the cost order is void.  And the reason for that is the Hong Kong Bar Association's concealment of all of this.  Mr. Robertson, Jeffrey Robertson, also a Sanchez lawyer, advised me, and I wrote to the Bar  Association that in England, Australia, and Canada, no bar tribunal would act on an anonymous  complaint.  Absolutely not.  Because there's the risk, it's motivated by malice and prejudice.  So you have to think about in January 2017, when at the annual general meeting, the Hong  Kong Bar Council members pointed me out by my nationality and made remarks against me  that there was no evidence for.  Robertson advised that it could have come from the CIA or another intelligence agency.  And as for disclosure, Robertson, as I know myself, pointed out that to have a fair procedure,  the accused has a right to know who the accuser is and has a right to see the evidence before  him.  The Bar also wanted information on clients, Mr. Snowden and the Snowden refugees, that  are privileged and confidential.  And there is absolutely no way Mr. Snowden or the Snowden refugees would allow me to  disclose that.  Nevertheless, the Bar Association continues to proceed against me.  So there's three fatal problems with what the Bar Association did.  The anonymous complaint, they should not and cannot proceed on it.  It came from a large group of barristers who, for all I know, are the same people who are  in the Standing Committee on Discipline, the same people in the Bar Council, and the same  people in the Bar Discipline Tribunal.  And that it's quite clear that the complaint, because it's all about Mr. Snowden, that it's  politically motivated, and the targeting of me based on my nationality indicates that  it's also malicious.  And this is what Mr. Robertson is talking about.  Lawyers without borders requested disclosure.  Lawyers without borders Canada intervened and requested disclosure from the Bar Association.  Bar Association said, no, it's confidential and privileged.  How can an anonymous person have that kind of confidentiality and privilege?  So the Bar Association is trying to defend unknown people, which makes no sense.  Because no confidentiality or privilege exists.  So this is again continued concealment by the Hong Kong Bar Association.  Now after a year, why was all this happening?  But after a year, the Hong Kong Bar Association brought five new complaints against me.  What they're doing here is they're trying to grab data, trying to grab intelligence.  At the same time, they don't want to disclose anything to me.  And they want to prosecute me in these quasi-criminal proceedings.  And this is the same thing that big government does.  They want to reach out, and they want all the information from everybody, but they don't  want to be transparent and be accountable.  And as Ed Snowden said in Citizen 4, in the hands of a system whose reach is unlimited,  but whose safeguards are not.  Now on a higher level, on an overarching level, when you have organizations that are court  of rule of law that want information, for example, on Mr. Snowden, detailed information,  but at the same time won't even disclose to me as the barister for Mr. Snowden what evidence  they have against me to prosecute me.  All based on anonymous complaint.  This is all about government overreaching its boundaries, and at the same time not wanting  to disclose, not wanting to be transparent, not wanting to be accountable.  I'd like to mention Robert Pang.  Robert Pang is now the spokesperson for the Hong Kong Bar Association on the matters that  I've raised publicly about my treatment.  Now I'd just highlight he was a bar council member and the chairman on the Standing Committee  on Discipline in 2016.  Then he continued as the vice chairman of the bar in 2017 and the year after 2018.  At the same time, he was also director of the duty lawyer service council.  Now Mr. Pang had in his hands the anonymous complaints from the very beginning.  He was privy to that information from the very beginning.  And he's now the spokesman for the Hong Kong Bar Association.  Mr. Pang said recently, oh, we're not relying on the anonymous complaint anymore.  We're never relying on it.  But the original complaint said anonymous complaint.  I asked for disclosure, including the bar minutes, the bar council minutes, for meetings  stating that they're not proceeding on the anonymous complaints.  That has never been disclosed to me.  Then Mr. Pang said there's an identified complainant.  For two years I've asked for a disclosure of that.  No identification of a complainant.  And Mr. Pang, by saying that, after two years saying there's an identified complainant,  it's completely unethical to have hidden that from me for two years.  But it doesn't matter because there is no identified complainant because Mr. Pang was  asked for the identified complainant as identity or her identity and it was never given.  So what the bar association did is they brought another five complaints against me for not  replying to their demands for disclosure of my information on my clients and my cases.  So they're using their powers to punish me for not disclosing.  But at the same time I had written to the bar association saying please disclose to  me all the evidence you have against me and then I'll take advice from Mr. Robertson,  Queens Council and then I'll reply to you.  They never disclosed.  Instead after a year they brought fresh proceedings against me for not replying, which is a lie.  I did reply.  I'd like to go back in history a little bit and this goes back to rule of law.  Mouth of the lion in Venice in the 14th centuries, what had happened was post boxes of a lion's  face were put in and people could put in anonymous complaints, criminal complaints.  And by the late 14th century there was the council of ten that would decide who they  would prosecute based on anonymous complaints.  Almost two centuries later Venice government decided well we have to make sure there are  three witnesses.  This was a reign of terror.  And as Mark Twain had stated that there were the terrible lion's mouths.  These were the throats down which went the anonymous accusation thrust and secretly in  the dead of night by the enemy that doomed many an innocent man.  This kind of behavior is not rule of law.  And I'm pointing out to you the way human beings have behaved in history.  There's also the existence of the star chambers which existed between the 15th and 18th century  in England but today they're basically referred to as a legal administrative bodies which  are making strict or arbitrary rulings with secretive proceedings.  And John Cameron, Queen's Council in Canada in describing the way the Hong Kong Bar Association  is behaving says does this remind you of the star chamber, complainants and adjudicators  protected from public accountability in a professional body engaged to protect the public.  Governor O'Rourke has written extensively about all that's happened in Hong Kong with  myself and my clients but basically how this is an attack by powerful government and the  Bar Association really attacking seven vulnerable people who helped Mr. Snowden.  And John Cameron, the Queen's Council had said that if an anonymous complaint came to  him if he was a Bar Council chairman he'd throw it in the bin.  And that's exactly what should have been done in Hong Kong but was not.  Manfred Nellich, the former UN Special Rapporteur on torture commented on the Hong Kong Bar Association's  behavior and says that current actions against TIPO could only be explained by the fact that  probably enormous pressure from outside is exercised.  Oliver Stone discussed the Hong Kong Bar Association and the government's treatment  saying it was outrageous.  Now going to the Snowden refugees at the very bottom Oliver Stone's quoted in the National  Post of Canada.  He talks about Snowden, I think he helped humanity by pointing out a situation I think  is intolerable still.  And then he talks about the people who helped them were human beings and in a way it's about  human beings against governments.  So in summary you've seen the Hong Kong government abusing its powers against seven vulnerable  people using disproportionate resources.  Canada continually delays knowing very well that it's not safe for the Snowden refugees  in Hong Kong and they've done nothing to make a decision.  The Sri Lankan government having come into Hong Kong I threatened my clients.  So why are these seven, the only seven Snowden refugees on the entire planet, why are they  so special to these governments and why has Canada delayed?  And in my view this comes down to the Snowden refugees are something, they represent something  that every government is afraid of.  That they have the moral strength and conscience to do the right thing despite being deprived  of everything in Hong Kong, that they don't fear the government and that they're willing  to protect whistleblowers and they represent a force of transparency and accountability.  And Stone is asking and he was quoted on the 29th of November 2018, why hasn't Canada taken  in these people?  You know, they'd be an asset.  Just last over a week ago Justin Trudeau talked about Canada signing up to the global compact  on migration and he says Canadians should be proud of this, that we're showing leadership  on one of the important issues around the world which is migrations and immigration.  And we're demonstrating that rigorous systems and an open policy actually leads to economic  growth and economic advantages in stronger communities.  And being able to do this in a way that shows global leadership and of course does not impinge  on our own sovereignty is something that Canadians should be proud of.  But Trudeau has done nothing.  He's not spoken about the Snowden refugees and no decision has been made on their cases.  And what we don't understand is through the legal team in Montreal, an NGO is set up and  we've raised funds to pay for everything for the Snowden refugees in coming to Canada and  living in Canada.  So there's no cost to the tax paper.  So why has Trudeau, why has the Minister of Immigration and Med Hussain, a former refugee  himself who obtained refugee status in Canada, why have they done nothing?  Why does Canada continue to tolerate that the people who are asking for protection to  be left at risk and fear and deprived of their dignity?  Why has Canada not made a decision?  Why do they continue to drag their feet?  So there's a standoff.  Hong Kong doesn't want to decide the cases.  Canada doesn't want to decide the cases.  I have no doubt if Canada rejects the cases, Hong Kong will reject them.  So we have two jurisdictions, two states dancing around the Snowden refugees and forgetting  about them.  And this is disgraceful.  I'll come back to this later, but this has been going on for more than two years now  and the clients do need everybody's support.  That means financial support.  I'll talk about that later.  What I'd like to do is to have a short Q&A and then after the Q&A I'm going to proceed  to another issue.  So if anybody has any questions, I'll take questions for about five minutes.  I'm going to get this in half with that.  So do we have questions?  Can I please listen to the question?  Okay, we have a couple of questions here.  The first one is as Hong Kong is increasingly under pressure from China, where harassment  of human rights laureates is routine.  Do you think China is involved in this case?  And if so, is it based on pressure from the US or is it professional literacy?  The last part I couldn't understand.  You talked about China, something about the US.  Yes, do you think China is involved in this case?  And if so, is it based on pressure from the USA?  As Manfred Noah could point out, in his view, it's likely there's a powerful outside force  putting pressure on the Hong Kong bar, on the Hong Kong government.  One thing I should mention is mainland China is the largest weapons and arms supplier to  Sri Lanka.  And there's clearly an interest of the mainland Chinese not to have Sri Lanka criticized.  The second issue is Beijing and Hong Kong do not want ethnic minorities in their jurisdiction,  particularly not refugees.  China is ethnocentric in its politics and at the same time Hong Kong is not a multicultural  society.  So the narrative of the Snowden refugees is not consistent with the narrative of the Hong  Kong government.  The Hong Kong government is there's no such thing as refugees or asylum seekers.  They're all illegal migrants.  They've only come in here to take money away from us.  As for the United States, I have no doubt that the United States and the other five  eyes have an interest in what happens in Hong Kong.  And I have no doubt they're putting pressure on Canada.  Okay.  So do you want to go on with the next question from the internet?  Yes.  And also, are you surprised about how the other party strikes you so hard during this  case?  I was surprised that the Hong Kong government were the instigators.  The government that's supposed to provide international protection to refugees and asylum  seekers, that it was the very party that my clients have put their trust into is the party  that's attacked them and their lawyer.  And this is disgraceful.  And this whole conduct was a surprise in the beginning.  But as things progressed, I realized that Hong Kong is not a democracy.  It's an authoritarian system where the leaders are the majority of the leaders and the leadership  of Hong Kong is appointed by Beijing.  So this is a jurisdiction that has had democratic freedoms and constitutional rights steadily  eroded over the last couple of years.  So now it wasn't a surprise in the end because quite clearly the Hong Kong government has  no interest in listening to its society.  They have no interest in listening to their wants, needs and concerns.  Okay.  Thanks.  So if I see that right, we have one question over there.  No, not really.  Okay.  Oh, there's another one.  Yes, please.  Micro number two.  Excuse me.  Yes.  Do you think there's a connection to the Huawei case?  The which case?  The daughter of the boss of Huawei, the main investor, has been held in Kamala for a very  well difficult legal issue.  And I think they are playing a very prudently game here.  Do you think?  It's Huawei.  Huawei is the telecom company.  Yes, I understand.  The treatment of the Snowden refugees is just part and parcel of the discrimination and  racism that exists in Hong Kong and in Mainland China against ethnic minorities.  And I don't think there's any direct link to the Huawei case.  But that's a completely different subject, which I really don't have time to address  today.  Okay.  I think that's also okay.  And I don't see any more questions.  Oh, there's another one.  Hello.  So I think that's the last question.  Yes, last question.  Yeah.  Thanks.  Micro number one.  Thank you for your work.  Second, is there, were there any attempts by your colleagues, various colleagues in Hong  Kong to maybe also issue a statement of even larger anonymous group?  Sorry.  Were there any attempts by your colleagues and the Hong Kong Barista Association to  also issue a statement or to make a counter complaint and then sign it, you know, larger  anonymous group or any, have you received any support from your colleagues?  No, absolutely none.  No, not the only colleague that was sympathetic and supported me was the person who said,  your nationality was raised at the annual general meeting in January 2017.  Please be careful.  They recognized I had done nothing wrong.  That was the only time.  Okay.  Thanks.  It's very hard to, to hear that.  And the more I'm happy that you're here.  And I think you've got a little surprise for us, right?  I do.  I'm going to be with somebody who's visiting right now and I'd like to bring them on the  person on the screen.  Okay.  So can we please get, hello, good evening.  This is Vanessa, one of the Snowy Revuges.  Hi, Vanessa.  How are you?  I'm okay.  I'm a little bit nervous right now.  All right.  Don't be nervous.  Is there anything you want to tell the audience today about your situation in Hong Kong?  Yes.  Thank you so much for supporting us while we're doing both time.  And now our audience is not here in Hong Kong because the Hong Kong bar, the Hong Kong  bar, I'm sorry, I'm just a little bit nervous.  Vanessa, was it the Hong Kong bar that caused me to leave Hong Kong?  Yeah, the Hong Kong bar, sorry, now Mr. Robert Tebow is not here in Hong Kong because the  Hong Kong bar, they bring anonymous complaints against Mr. Tebow.  And the Hong Kong bar is trying to defy me and other Snowden refugee, Mr. Tebow, of our  being a lawyer.  And Snowden refugee never complained about Mr. Tebow to the Hong Kong bar.  And the Hong Kong bar put me in my daughter at risk and it is a shame to the Hong Kong  bar what has done to Mr. Tebow.  And the Hong Kong bar, they never help and never care.  And Snowden refugee, and just to go...  The Prime Minister of Canada, right?  Yeah, yes, the Prime Minister of Canada, she talks about helping refugee whites, a typical  of Snowden refugee in the world and why is delaying, why is that making decision now.  And we are not safe in Hong Kong.  We cannot go back to our home country.  And I hope they make the decisions now.  So stop delaying, make the decisions now.  Thank you, Vanessa.  Thank you.  If I just may step in very shortly, you don't have to thank us.  We have to thank you for what you did.  Does anyone have any questions for Vanessa?  Yeah, do you have questions?  You have the chance to ask directly.  Don't be shy.  Okay.  I don't see any questions.  You see, they're all excited as well, so everybody is nervous.  There's no questions.  There's no questions.  There's one coming.  Okay.  Okay, microphone one.  Please ask a question.  Hello.  Yeah.  I'd like to know, how's life for refugees in Hong Kong?  So do you feel there's any public support for refugees in Hong Kong and how is your quality  of living in general?  What I'm said for my only interview, I don't ask a refugee or asylum seekers in Hong Kong.  I don't get any assistance from the Hong Kong government since 2016 when the Hong Kong government  is questioning me about how many days I would put in stay in my house.  So I told her that I cannot answer her question, she should contact my lawyer Mr. Robert Tebow.  So after that, I can stop my assistance.  So I, me and my daughter never get any assistance until now from the Hong Kong government, even  my daughter's education, my rent.  So it's so hard for me to survive, but I'm very thankful to my lawyer Mr. Robert Tebow  and the people who support me in Canada and all over the world who didn't make the donation  and make us fundraising for us.  So me and my daughter can survive in some southern refugee, but I'm also afraid because  we are not safe here in Hong Kong, so it's not easy for me and my daughter and some other  southern refugee in Hong Kong.  So we are not safe here.  In general, it's not easy here in Hong Kong.  It's very terrible life here.  It's very depressing and I need to be brave and I have to be trust to my lawyer Mr. Robert  Tebow and my lawyer Mr. Canada.  So I hope soon I can, me and my daughter and the other southern refugees can get into  our safe, clean, well-off rhythm.  Thank you.  Thanks to you.  Thank you so much.  Okay.  Are there more questions?  I don't see, oh, there's one coming.  If I may go on.  Yes.  And may I ask you what would happen to you?  If you were denied asylum basically.  Sorry?  What would happen to you if you were denied refugee status in Hong Kong or Canada or both?  In both places.  What would happen to you Vanessa, if your cases were rejected?  In my case, if my case is rejected in Hong Kong or in Canada, I cannot go back to Philippines.  I have very high profile right now.  So I should, me and my daughter will be called in Philippines.  So my life is, there's no point for me and my daughter to survive anywhere.  So maybe we'll be killed, maybe my daughter.  There's no any future for her.  And there's no life waiting for me and my daughter.  The only thing is sending back to the Philippines and me and my daughter will be killed.  They'll be died.  There's nothing for me and my daughter.  Thank you.  Okay.  So.  Any other questions?  This is the last question.  There's a last question, yes.  Okay.  Microphone please.  Hello.  Kind of reluctant to asking you this, but I have to do.  If you could go back in time and decide again, what would you do?  Sorry, can you say it again?  If you could go back in time and decide again after knowing what you know now and having  been through this, would you do that again?  Would you help Snowden again?  Would you decide the same again or different?  I always say yes.  I wanted to help him.  And for me what he's doing is the right thing.  He's not going to do anything wrong.  And I'm not doing anything wrong.  I just help him.  And for me he's, he's helped.  So I help him.  And Vanessa, would you do it again?  Yes, I will help him again.  Thanks.  I will do it again.  Wow.  I have shivers running down my spine by so much humanity and yeah, brave, brave, brave  woman.  Thank you so much.  Okay.  Thank you.  Thank you, Vanessa.  You have a good night.  Thank you.  Okay.  Good night everyone.  Good night.  And best wishes.  Thank you.  Okay.  That's it.  That's it.  And let me just tell you, if you have some spare money, donate.  It's a good cause.  Thanks so much.  Thank you.
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