Hong Kong solicitors last night passed a vote of no confidence against the city's Law Society president Ambrose Lam following comments he made in June in support a controversial Beijing white paper.

Approximately 1,000 Law Society members are thought to have attended the extraodinary general meeting, which was called by a group of 50 lawyers earlier in the year who said Lam had caused "outrage in the legal community" and failed to defend Hong Kong's rule of law.

According to the final count, there were 2,392 votes against the president and 1,478 for him, while solicitors also voted for the president to withdraw his comments on the white paper and for the Law Society to issue a statement emphasizing the importance of the rule of law and judicial independence.

The vote marks a historic occasion for Hong Kong's legal community, it reported being the first time that a Law Society president has faced such a motion.

"The really important point is that the Law Society and future presidents are more likely to remain – at least outwardly – politically neutral," said one international lawyer.

"A strong marker has also been laid down to the legal and business community of Hong Kong of the importance of the Basic Law."

There are no rules which say the president must resign from his post, but those who instigated the motion have urged him to step down.

On their Facebook page they said: "We have witnessed one of the most unexpected results in the history of Hong Kong professional bodies. 

"We call on Mr Lam to accept members' verdict against him and resign as president. If he refuses to do so, we call on the Law Society's Council to do the right thing and exercise its powers to remove Mr Lam as president."

However, supporters of Lam point to his hard work and contribution to the legal profession over the last 10 years.

Lam first came under attack in June after he made positive comments on a recently issued Beijing white paper, which lawyers say raised issues about Hong Kong's autonomy and judicial independence.

His views were said to have "touched on the nerves" of the city's lawyers, while he was also criticised for commenting on political rather than legal aspects and for speaking prior to the approval of the sub-committee.

In a letter the president defended himself by saying that he only responded positively to what was a work report rather than a legal document, and that he had "stood firm against the scare-mongers within [Hong Kong's] community who said that the white paper changed or attempted to change Hong Kong's basic law".