HONG KONG – The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region government is steadfast on filing a complaint with the World Trade Organization on recent US tariffs imposed on the city, Acting Chief Executive Eric Chan Kwok-ki said on Tuesday.

Speaking to reporters ahead of the Executive Council meeting, Chan said the complaint will go ahead as the US side has completely ignored the city's status as a separate customs territory and despite Hongkong Post announcing on Monday evening that it will resume accepting parcels to the United States starting Tuesday.

"This is absolutely inconsistent with the WTO rules. Of course, they have totally disregarded Hong Kong is a separate customs territory," Chan told reporters, responding to a US decision to impose 10 percent tariffs on goods from the Asian financial hub.

The HKPost decision came following confirmation from US authorities that no tariffs will be applied to such shipments.

The U.S. Postal Service last week suspended all inbound mail and packages from the Chinese mainland and HKSAR, then reversed that decision soon afterwards.

ALSO READ: Hongkong Post resumes accepting parcels to US

The acting chief executive, who serves as Hong Kong’s chief secretary, said the US side kept changing its arrangements and caused much inconvenience. "All I can say is the policies are mercurial," said Chan.

Despite the resumption of parcel post, he iterated that “we will still file a complaint on this matter with the WTO as the US arrangement is unreasonable”.

Chan is serving as the city’s acting chief executive as Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu is visiting Harbin, Heilongjiang province, for the Asian Winter Games.

Record number of CNY visitors

At the same briefing, Chan said Hong Kong recorded the highest number of visitors in a single month since the end of the pandemic with 1.4 million arrivals and the overall hotel occupancy rate reaching 90 percent during the Chinese New Year.

The number of tourists visiting Hong Kong in January hit 4.74 million, 3.73 million of them mainland tourists and posting a 24 percent and 25 percent year-on-year uptick, respectively.

READ MORE: HK logs 5.42m cross-boundary trips during CNY holiday

Civil servants’ pay

Asked whether the government will consider freezing or cutting civil servant pay to address the budget deficit, the acting CE said the government will consider a number of factors, including living costs and staff morale according to an established mechanism before coming up with a pay proposal.

ALSO READ: Chan: Budget deficit to fall below HK$100b in 2024-25

Wearing wrong bibs at the marathon

Regarding three runners who had been disqualified from the Standard Chartered Hong Kong Marathon 2025 on Sunday for wearing incorrect bibs, Chan described the incident as “carelessness”, saying the organizer will remind participants to thoroughly check their identities ahead of future events.