FACTS 1. These appeals are brought by two families against the Director of Immigration’s (“the Director”) refusal to grant the 1st appellants extensions of permission to remain in Hong Kong. 2. The 1st appellants, Ms Comilang and Mrs Luis, are foreign nationals with no right of abode and no right to enter or remain in Hong Kong. The 1st appellants (“the mothers”) are the mothers of the other appellants, who are all minors (“the child appellants”). Amongst them, Ms Comilang’s daughter and Ms Luis’ eldest son are Hong Kong permanent residents whereas the remaining appellants enjoy Hong Kong resident status. The mothers applied for extensions of permission to remain in Hong Kong to take care of the child appellants. 3. The Director refused their applications as they did not fall within any of the recognized categories under his immigration policy and there were no exceptional circumstances to justify extensions of permission to remain based on humanitarian or compassionate grounds. 4. The appellants sought judicial reviews against the Director’s refusal decisions, arguing that he wrongly failed to take into account and give effect to a series of rights under the Basic Law (“the BL”); the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (“the ICCPR”); the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (“the ICESCR”); the Convention on the Rights of the Child (“the CRC”); and the best interests of the child principle at common law. 5. The mothers contended that they were entitled to assert the relevant rights directly to dispute the Director’s respective refusal decisions. The child appellants asserted the relevant rights on their own behalves, contending that such rights entitled them to have the mothers granted permission to stay in Hong Kong to take care of them, or at least required the Director to consider those rights in making his decisions. 6. The judicial reviews were dismissed in both the Court of First Instance and the Court of Appeal, with both courts holding that, by virtue of the immigration reservation under section 11 (“the Reservation”) of the Hong Kong Bill of Rights Ordinance (Cap 383) (“HKBORO”), which enjoys constitutional status by virtue of Article 39 of the BL, the asserted rights were not engaged. ISSUES 7. The central questions in these appeals were whether, in deciding the mothers’ applications, the Director is obliged to take into account the parent-and-child families’ enjoyment of any applicable fundamental rights while living in Hong Kong and whether the Reservation exempts immigration authorities from having to take into account any rights protected under the BL of a child member of the family. 8. The Court affirmed the well-established constitutional status, scope and effect of the Reservation. The Reservation mirrors and gives effect to the ICCPR immigration reservation as applied to Hong Kong and is consistent with the rights of sovereign states to control the entry, residence and expulsions of non-residents. It operates at the constitutional level in excluding immigration legislation governing entry into, stay in and departure from Hong Kong from the scope of the provisions of the Bill of Rights (“the BOR”). Further, the BL must be interpreted as a coherent whole and consistent with the Reservation. Thus, the Reservation is not confined to excluding rights in the BOR but extends to similar rights in the BL in the specified immigration context. 9. As the mothers do not have the right to enter and remain in Hong Kong, they may not rely on BOR rights by virtue of the Reservation. Neither can the mothers rely on rights under Chapter III of the BL, as their BL rights are enjoyed pursuant to article 41 of the BL, which is in turn qualified by the Reservation. 10. As for the rights of the child appellants, the Court held that the Reservation generally precludes reliance on BOR rights so long as the relevant decision involves the entry into, stay in or departure from Hong Kong of a person not having the right to enter or remain. It would upset the purpose of the Reservation and article 39 of the BL should a person with no right to enter and remain be able to overcome that position by relying on someone else’s rights. The same applies to the child appellants’ BL rights, which must be read coherently with the Reservation. 11. The Reservation should also be read together with article 154(2) of the BL, which affirms the need for immigration control. Accordingly, while the child appellants enjoy rights under article 37 of the BL (being rights similar to those under the BOR), as well as rights under article 24 of the BL (which has no equivalent in the BOR), they do not enable a permanent resident to require the Director to permit any other person to enter Hong Kong. The reliance on article 24 depends on an asserted family unity right incidental to the right of abode and such right was limited by the Reservation which excludes BOR and similar BL rights whether invoked directly or in connection with the enjoyment of another right. Therefore, the Reservation prevents the child appellants from relying on their own rights to require the mothers to be granted extensions of permission to stay. 12. The appellants could not rely on the ICESCR as it is neither self-executing nor domesticated. Even if it were domesticated, it would be subject to the Reservation. This is the same for the CRC. Further, the common law rights relied upon relate to custody and wardship and did not assist the appellants in the context of their appeals concerning immigration decisions. DISPOSITION 13. Accordingly, the Court concluded that the Director was not duty bound to take into account the various rights relied upon. The appeals were unanimously dismissed.