A letter from Bernie So |
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I write to inform your readers that I recently returned to the United Kingdom from official visits to Ghana in West Africa in February and from the Mainland in March. Currently, I am planning an official trip to Japan, and second trip to Cyprus, before I get posted back to Hong Kong in July 2004. Working for the Central Police Training & Development Authority (Centrex) in the United Kingdom on a two-year secondment programme, one of my training responsibilities is to manage a 'train-the-trainers' programme on civil policing for Police officers in various countries, including the Mainland, who will be deployed by their home countries to work on the United Nations' peace-keeping missions. I have got two experienced Police sergeants who work for me on this training project in Accra, the capital of Ghana. During my stay in Accra, I met a number of Police officers from different African countries who were there to attend a three-week course run by Centrex. Like most other overseas counterparts that I have met, the African Police officers were very interested in learning about the Hong Kong Police and the general socio-political situation in Hong Kong after the Handover in 1997. Beijing & Henan Two weeks after I had returned to the UK, I flew to Beijing to have meetings with senior officials from the Ministry of Public Security (MPS) and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA). I visited Mainland in my official capacity as a specialist member of a joint delegation from the United Nations' Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNOHCHR), in Geneva, and the Great Britain-China Centre (GBCC), in London. My responsibility on this visit was to assess the training needs on human rights protection in law enforcement in China, and to submit a report to UNOHCHR and GBCC on my return to the UK. The three-day meetings with MPS and MFA officials ended in complete success. I have now written a report on behalf of our Joint Delegation and, subject to funding, I shall look forward to meeting the first group of Mainland Police trainers attending a human rights course at Bramshill later this year. Hopefully, either I or my successor will have another chance of visiting the Mainland on a follow-up course before mid-2004. During my visit to the Mainland, I flew to Henan Province and visited the Henan Public Security Bureau, and one of the Police training schools in Zhengzhou. It was a very impressive and worthwhile visit. My Mainland counterparts were apparently surprised to find out that I, being an official member from an overseas visiting delegation, turned out to be a Police officer from the Hong Kong SAR, China. Last but not least, I shall return to Hong Kong in June/July this year for a family re-union after working alone in the UK for more than a year. I am probably the first ever Hong Kong secondee to work in Bramshill alone without his spouse or children. It is a big challenge to me having to take care of myself without family support in addition to having to work in a foreign country. I send my warmest regards to fellow colleagues working so admirably during the recent atypical pneumonia crisis, and in line with our finest tradition and professionalism.
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