​The Home Affairs Department (HAD) announced today (April 1) that the Director of Home Affairs had respectively appointed 464 persons and 476 persons (940 persons in total) as members of District Youth Community Building… read more
The following is issued on behalf of the Hong Kong Monetary Authority:
The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) and the Global Coalition to Fight Financial Crime (GCFFC) co-hosted the APAC Fighting Financial Crime Conference 2025 today (April 1), under the theme of “Fighting Financial Crime in a More Complex World”.
The event gathered leading global and regional anti-money laundering (AML) and counter-financing of terrorism (CFT) experts together with participants from across Hong Kong’s AML/CFT ecosystem, including representation from banks, government agencies, financial regulators, and law enforcement agencies. Participants shared insights on how to improve the fight against fraud and financial crime with keynotes, panels and interactive discussions.
Welcoming the participants, Mr Raymond Chan, Executive Director (Enforcement and AML) of the HKMA, said, “Criminality has evolved on the back of the digitalisation of financial services and we must respond quicker and with the same level of innovation, including how we collaborate to share information and leverage artificial intelligence to deliver step changes in the results achieved.”
Mr Keith Yip, Director of Crime and Security of the Hong Kong Police Force, said, “Through relentless collaboration and cutting-edge strategies, we shall prevail in the fight against financial crimes — from cyber-enabled fraud to transnational money laundering. Harnessing data-driven intelligence and global partnerships, we reaffirm our pledge to protect vulnerable communities and disrupt criminal networks, securing a resilient future for all.”
Mr John Cusack, Chair of the GCFFC, thanked the HKMA for bringing leading experts together and said, “We invited leading financial crime fighters from the public, private and third sectors to meet and discuss critical topical and emerging issues under the theme ‘Fighting Financial Crime in a More Complex World’ and we had a lively discussion which helped everyone better understand threats and the best practices and evolving initiatives.”
In a series of panels and breakout sessions, participants shared experience and expertise in maximising opportunities to enhance industry efforts to combat money laundering and financial crime, strengthening protection for customers, and improving the outcomes achieved by the global AML system.
Some of the highlights included:
The Secretary for Health, Professor Lo Chung-mau, met with Deputy Commissioner of the National Medical Products Administration Dr Xu Jinghe today (April 1) to have an in-depth exchange on the regulatory regime and reform of drugs and medical devices.
Professor Lo said, “The Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area has been ushering in immense opportunities for medical and biotechnological developments in recent years. The National 14th Five-Year Plan has expressed clear support to develop Hong Kong into an international innovation and technology hub. Biomedicine and medical innovation are directly related to people’s life and health and also represent immense new quality productive forces. The Resolution of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee on Further Deepening Reform Comprehensively to Advance Chinese Modernization adopted by the Third Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee also pointed out the need to deepen medical and healthcare reform and to support the development mechanisms for innovative drugs and medical devices.
“The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) Government strenuously works in line with the national objective of deepening medical and healthcare reform by pursuing innovation in the medical field. While integrating into the national development, the HKSAR will capitalise on its unique advantages of international influence and professions to the fullest to develop the city into an international health and medical innovation hub, thereby enabling the innovative medical technologies to go global and attract foreign investment and developing new quality productive forces in biomedicine. Hong Kong will strive to give full play to our strengths to serve the country’s needs amid the comprehensive deepening of reform.”
While introducing the approval mechanism for drugs and medical devices, Professor Lo emphasised, “The HKSAR Government will expedite the reform of the approval mechanism for drugs and medical devices to meet the institutional requirement necessary for the health and medical innovation development, such as extending the ‘1+’ mechanism to cover all new drugs, including vaccines and advanced therapy products, since November 1 last year; preparing for the establishment of the Hong Kong Centre for Medical Products Regulation (CMPR) to progress towards the ‘primary evaluation’ approach, with a view to fully strengthening the drug approval capability of the HKSAR; and taking forward preparatory work for legislating for the statutory regulation of medical devices to dovetail with the timetable for the establishment of the CMPR.”
The Director of Health, Dr Ronald Lam, and representatives from the Health Bureau and the Department of Health also attended the meeting today.
The Food and Environmental Hygiene Department (FEHD) announced today (April 1) that open auctions for a total of 642 stalls in 46 public markets will be held in April. Market stalls not taken at open auctions will be avail… read more
The Water Supplies Department (WSD) announced that a WSD-registered consumer of a subdivided flat in North Point, Hong Kong, was convicted today (April 1) of failing to comply with the Water Authority’s request to provide relevant information or documents for a suspected case of overcharging for water, in contravention of regulation 47A of the Waterworks Regulations. The consumer pleaded guilty to the offence at the Eastern Magistrates’ Courts.
A spokesman for the WSD said that the Waterworks (Amendment) Ordinance (the amended WWO) 2024 has strengthened the power of the Water Authority in evidence collection and information disclosure during the investigation of suspected cases of overcharging for water. The Water Authority can request the landlords, their agents, etc, to provide the tenancy agreement, receipt or payment record for charges for water. Failure to comply with such a request can be an offence, and the offender is liable on conviction to a maximum fine of $10,000 and a further fine of up to $1,000 for each day the offence continues. It is anticipated that there will be more prosecution cases. The maximum penalty for overcharging tenants of subdivided units (SDUs) for water has been raised to $25,000 to deter this illegal act. Moreover, providing false or misleading information to the Water Authority is also an offence with a maximum penalty of a $25,000 fine and six months’ imprisonment.
The WSD spokesman strongly appealed to landlords to apply for the installation of separate water meters for their SDUs, which can greatly reduce the risk of contravening the amended WWO. The WSD encourages the public to report any illegal act of overcharging SDU tenants for water for follow-up and investigation by the department. The public can call the WSD Hotline 3468 4963 or WhatsApp 5665 5517 to apply for the installation of separate water meters for SDUs. The WhatsApp hotline also handles matters relating to water overcharging in SDUs. Alternatively, the public can call the WSD Customer Enquiry Hotline 2824 5000 to report water overcharge cases. After calling the hotline and choosing a language, they can press “7” for reporting to staff directly. read more