Part VII International Securities, Including Markets and Clearing Systems, 23 Hong Kong Markets and Exchanges

This chapter describes the main elements of the current financial sector activity in Hong Kong and the conditions under which they function. It highlights Hong Kong's financial markets and economy that have suffered an economic downturn following the 2019 protests and sustained by the Covid—19 pandemic. It also mentions how Hong Kong implements the principal standards and reforms adopted at the international level, particularly in relation to the resolution of Global Systemically Important Financial Institutions (G—SIFIs). This chapter provides an overview of the monetary, banking, equity, debt, insurance, and derivatives markets in Hong Kong. It talks about Hong Kong's de facto constitution, the Basic Law, which aids the economy in maintaining its capitalist system for fifty years from 1 July 1997.

Cooperation between Local Authorities in Europe as a Force for Strengthening Local Democracy

The authors chart the rise of horizontal cooperation between local authorities in the wider Europe as a post-war phenomenon, examining the main forms of cooperation in this area, how they have developed and what impact they have had and are having on the development of decentralised government in Europe. They then map out the main characteristics of the development of a European model of local democracy. Attention is given to the principal standards in this field and how they are evolving, with special emphasis on the European Charter of Local Self-Government.

International standards in the fight against terrorism

Terrorism as a phenomenon of the modern society threatens to jeopardize the most important achievements of the modern society. The international community devotes much attention to the fight against terrorism and a number of legal instruments and standards that illustrate the basic message have been formulated in international documents - and the message is that it is possible to fight against terrorism effectively only if principal standards of internationally protected human rights are fulfilled. The fight against terrorism must never lead to the abolition of values and freedoms that are imperiled by terrorist acts. Even if the need to impose certain restrictions for protection of legitimate interests arouses they must be controlled, while they should protect basic human rights and freedoms. Regulating formal conditions for human rights limitation is the way to control the fight against terrorism and prevent the unlimited space for violation of the established and guaranteed freedom standards. The paper refers to the provisions of the European Convention on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which provide some limitations to the guaranteed human rights as well as the limitation to their usage also exploring to what extent these restrictions are applied in the fight against terrorism.

The European Convention for the Prevention of Torture: 1992–1997

Five years ago we surveyed the early years of the European Convention for the Prevention of Torture, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment1. At that time there was already a good deal of information available regarding themodus operandiof the Committee which was established but comparatively little regarding the manner in which the Committee was translating its mandate2into practice. Today the picture has changed considerably. The manner in which the Committee conducts its work is essentially unchanged but from the large corpus of published reports it is possible now to map out the principal standards promulgated by the Committee and through which it seeks to fulfil its functions3. The purpose of this article is to highlight these developments.