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Following is the transcript of remarks made by the Secretary for Security, Mr Ambrose S K Lee, at a media session at the ground floor lobby of the Central Government Offices West Wing after the Fight Crime Committee (FCC) meeting this afternoon (November 27):
Secretary for Security: The Fight Crime Committee held its meeting this afternoon, reviewing the crime situation for the first 10 months of 2007. The law and order situation in Hong Kong remained stable. The overall crime figure remained stable, and recorded a slight decrease of less than one per cent. As far as violent crime is concerned, there is a slight increase - also of less than one per cent. Crimes that have recorded a decrease in numbers included burglary, robbery, theft of vehicle and theft inside car. And those crimes that recorded an increase included miscellaneous theft, indecent assault and rape. Overall, Hong Kong is a very safe place.
The Government is very concerned about the drug abuse situation in Hong Kong, especially young people's abuse of psychotropic drugs. In his Policy Address, the Chief Executive has appointed the Secretary for Justice, who is also the Deputy Chairman of the Fight Crime Committee, to head a special Task Force, an interdepartmental task force, to tackle the problem.
The Task Force has held its first meeting and members have discussed the mode of its operation and ways to map out various measures to tackle the problem. The concerned departments have been asked to review their programmes and to report to the Task Force in its next meeting.
The Secretary for Justice has also met members of the Action Committee Against Narcotics (ACAN) and the Drug Liaison Committee and solicited their views on how to tackle the youth drug abuse problem. The Secretary for Justice also briefed members of the FCC and took on board the views of members this afternoon. He will take these views into consideration in future in formulating appropriate strategies in dealing with the youth drug abuse problem.
Reporter: Do you expect a sharp rise in drug abuse by youngsters during Christmas...?
Secretary for Security: We certainly do not hope there will be a sharp rise in any people, young people and adults alike, taking drugs during Christmas. But Christmas is a period when people have good time, parties. So we wish to issue a reminder to Hong Kong people to distance themselves from any kind of drugs during these happy days in Christmas.
Reporter: How would Government prevent that?
Secretary for Security: Of course we will step up our publicity and the Police will step up their patrol.
Reporter: (On underground banking)
Secretary for Security: First of all, I wish to remind Hong Kong business people that when they are doing business in any place outside Hong Kong, they should respect the local rules and regulation laws, and should not commit any violation of the local laws in respect of control of movement of money and capital. And in this respect, we have a very effective regime combating money laundering and terrorist financing. We also have good liaison with law enforcement agencies in the Mainland and elsewhere dealing with these things.
But you are asking the scale of this kind of underground money transactions. We do not have very scientific analysis yet, but we do have a very effective regime dealing with the problem.
Reporter: You said you are unable to tell us the scale of this problem. Has the authority detected any suspected money laundering cases...?
Secretary for Security: Well, we don't have a figure. But time and again, law enforcement agencies did discover there were syndicates operating through this underground channel in money laundering. I remember when I was the Commissioner of the ICAC, the ICAC did investigate a case of money laundering involving the transfer of cash from Shenzhen to Hong Kong and we arrested a number of people including a bank manager in Hong Kong.
Reporter: (On election violence)
Secretary for Security: Hong Kong people always feel proud that we have very clean, very fair elections in Hong Kong. The use of violence is prohibited in any kind of electioneering activities. So I wish to appeal to the candidates and their supporters to remain calm and use civilised methods for their election activities.
(Please also refer to the Chinese portion of the transcript.)
Ends/Tuesday, November 27, 2007
Issued at HKT 20:30
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