Hong Kong Forcefully Repatriates 58 Taiwanese Practitioners

At 10:45PM June 29 2002, flight CI617 of the Taiwan China Airline arrived at Hong Kong airport. Fifty-eight Taiwanese practitioners were refused entry into Hong Kong. Forty-eight of them were forced to take flight CI61810 back to Taiwan at 0:30AM on June 30. The other ten practitioners were made to leave Hong Kong airport at 10:15AM June 30. The immigration department employed force to repatriate some of the practitioners including the use stretchers and canvas bags. These inhuman means destroyed the reputation of Hong Kong as the Oriental Pearl. China’s promise of “No Change for 50 years” and its policy of “one country, two systems” was also challenged.