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Caution urged over Govt's extradition deal with China

Author
Felix Marwick,
Publish Date
Tue, 9 Dec 2014, 5:26AM
Green MP Catherine Delahunty (Photo: NZ Herald)
Green MP Catherine Delahunty (Photo: NZ Herald)

Caution urged over Govt's extradition deal with China

Author
Felix Marwick,
Publish Date
Tue, 9 Dec 2014, 5:26AM

Updated 7:18am: The Government's being urged to exercise extreme caution before cutting any extradition deals with China.

It's emerged China has raised the issue, with President Xi Jinping telling our Prime Minister there are some Chinese living here who're alleged to have obtained funds via corrupt practices.

Green MP Catherine Delahunty says it's concerning that we could be toying with the idea.

She claims the Chinese Government creates corruption charges, if it wants to reach political dissenters.

Ms Delahunty says the human rights issues associated with this could be quite serious for those people.PM 

The Prime Minister says firm assurances would have to be made before New Zealand agreed to deporting alleged Chinese criminals back to their homeland.

He says we don't have an extradition treaty with China because that country has the death penalty.

But Mr Key says that doesn't mean formal discussions over extradition can't happen.

However he says they'd have to have a high degree of confidence New Zealand's conditions would be met

'China needs justice reforms' 

A lobby group wants to see justice reforms in China, before we extradite anyone there.

Amnesty International executive director Grant Bayldon says ensuring alleged criminals face justice is important - but only if China cleans up its justice system.

"Stops doing thing like torturing people to extract confessions or having political influence in the court system there."

Grant Bayldon says any promise of fair trials from China, is only as good as the paper it's written on.

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