Judge Roberto Ribeiro, the longest-serving justice at Hong Kong’s highest court, has been reappointed to the Court of Final Appeal.
Chief Executive John Lee accepted Ribeiro’s reappointment and expressed his gratitude for the judge’s contributions, according to a statement published on Thursday.
“Mr Justice Ribeiro is one of the most distinguished and intellectually able appellate judges at the highest level in Hong Kong,” Lee said.
“He has been highly praised as a ‘colossus’ in the legal world with a judicial reputation on par with that of the most eminent and experienced judges in the highest courts of major common law jurisdictions.”
Ribeiro began his career at the Court of Final Appeal in January 2000, according to his biography on the top court’s website. Before that, he served in the Court of First Instance and the Court of Appeal.
He is one of three permanent judges in the Court of Final Appeal, which also consists of non-permanent judges – most of whom are foreign judges from other common law jurisdictions such as the UK and Australia.
The veteran judge has presided over a number of high-profile politics-related cases, including one related to an August 2019 protest that involved seven prominent pro-democracy figures, including Martin Lee, Margaret Ng and Jimmy Lai.
In August last year, Ribeiro and four other top court judges unanimously dismissed the democrats’ appeal and upheld their convictions for knowingly taking part in an unauthorised assembly.
He also sat on a panel of five judges presiding over activist Tam Tak-chi’s sedition case. In March, they maintained that Tam was guilty of uttering “seditious words,” including the now-banned phrase, “Liberate Hong Kong, revolution of our times.”
