Ho Chi Minh in Hong Kong Anti-Colonial Networks, Extradition and the Rule of Law

It was the trial of a century in colonial Hong Kong when, in 1931?33, Ho Chi Minh - the future President of Vietnam - faced down deportation to French-controlled territory with a death sentence dangling over him. Thanks to his appeal to English common law, Ho Chi Minh won his reprieve. With extradition a major political issue in Hong Kong today, Geoffrey C. Gunn's examination of the legal case of Ho Chi Minh offers a timely insight into the rule of law and the issue of extradition in the former British colony. Utilizing little known archival material, Gunn sheds new light on Ho Chi Minh, communist and anti-colonial networks and Franco?British relations.

Introduction; 1. Setting up in Hong Kong and arrest; 2. Early life in France and move back to Asia; 3. The parallel case of Tan Malaka; 4. In revolutionary Guangzhou; 5. Mounting the defense: Ho Chi Minh's prison experience; 6. Legal process: Trial and tribulations; 7. Media coverage of the arrest and trial; 8. The French diplomatic demarche; 9. The privy council verdict, release and afterlife; Epilogue.

Geoffrey C. Gunn is Emeritus Professor at Nagasaki University, Japan, and Adjunct Professor at the University of Macau, China. His previously published work includes Rice Wars in Colonial Vietnam: The Great Vietnam Famine and the Viet Minh Rise to Power 1930–45 (2014).