WELLINGTON, New Zealand – On Friday, the New Zealand court left open the option of a man being extradited to China to face homicide fees in a landmark case that has diplomatic implications.

It is unclear that kyung Yup Kim’s extradition will continue in a case that has already dragged on for more than a decade.

The dispute is over whether New Zealand can be confident kim will receive a fair trial if he is sent to China and tortured. New Zealand has an extradition treaty with China.

On Friday, New Zealand’s Supreme Court considered a final ruling on the case, but asked for more details from Justice Minister Kris Faafoi and others, which will be sent until the end of July.

Split resolution 3-2 revealed that it was conceivable that New Zealand would offload sufficient assurances from China on Kim’s well-being, partially overturning an earlier Court of Appeal ruling.

Such assurances may come with confirmation that officials can stop at Kim at least every 48 hours of the investigation and that the trial will take place in Shanghai.

But the times have replaced since a former justice minister in a conservative government subsidized extradition. Faafoi comes from a liberal government and will have a way to continue at a time when relations with China have deteriorated.

The court stated that Faafoi sees things differently, saying he would have “the right to depart from the former minister’s decision. “

Faafoi said Friday he would not comment while the case is still ongoing.

Kim’s lead attorney, Tony Ellis, said they were surprised and disappointed by the Supreme Court’s biased decision. Ellis said the Communist Party of China remains a rogue state.

“It engages in the endemic use of torture, does not guarantee fair trials, and more broadly rejects the fundamental precept that it will have to respect foreign human rights laws,” Ellis said.

He said Kim had already suffered from severe depression and fitness disorders after being jailed for more than five years and spending 3 years under electronic surveillance, making him the oldest prisoner not to have been tried in elegant New Zealand.

Ellis said they would challenge the biased trial before the U. N. Human Rights Committee.

According to court documents, Kim is a South Korean citizen who moved to New Zealand more than 30 years ago with his circle of relatives when he was 14.

He is accused of killing a 20-year-old waitress and sex worker, Peiyun Chen, in Shanghai after traveling to the city to stop at another woman who was his friend at the time.

Chen discovered it in a Shanghai desert on New Year’s Eve 2009. An autopsy concluded that she had been strangled to death and had also been hit on the head with a blur.

Chinese police say they have forensic and circumstantial evidence linking Kim to the crime, adding a quilt discovered with the body. Police said a distraught Kim told an acquaintance that he might have “beaten to death a prostitute. “

Kim says he’s innocent. Ellis said his defense would be that his ex-girlfriend, who has ties to the Communist Party, is in favor of the crime.

Kim was arrested in 2011 after China requested his extradition on a charge of intentional homicide. He spent five years in a New Zealand criminal as his extradition case progressed before being released on bail.

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