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PoliticsHong Kong

Hong Kong court convicts Tiananmen vigil group activists

March 4, 2023

Hong Kong has undergone dramatic changes since the imposition of the national security law in the summer of 2020. Many pro-democracy politicians and activists have been arrested.

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People hold up their phones with the light on in the Causeway Bay district of Hong Kong on June 4, 2021
Every year the Tiananmen vigil in Hong Kong drew tens of thousands of people in the largest public commemoration of its kind on Chinese soil.Image: Isaac Lawrence/AFP

A Hong Kong court on Saturday convicted three former members of a group that organized annual vigils to mark China's 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown for failing to comply with a national security police request for information. 

Among those convicted was prominent pro-democracy activist Chow Hang-tung, 38, who was the former vice-chairperson of the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China.

Two other former standing committee members of the Alliance, Tang Ngok Kwan and Tsui Hon Kwong, were also found guilty.

The now-defunct group was the main organizer of Hong Kong's June 4 candlelight vigil for victims of China's Tiananmen Square crackdown.

Every year it drew tens of thousands of people in the largest public commemoration of its kind on Chinese soil.

What was the case about?

Before the Alliance decided to disband, police had accused it of being a foreign agent and sought details about its operations and finances.

But the group refused to cooperate. It argued that authorities were arbitrarily labeling pro-democracy outfits as foreign agents and that they did not have the right to ask for its information.

On Saturday, the court ruled that the activists were obliged to answer the notice served to them, and that their refusal to do so was unjustified.

Sentencing in the case is expected on March 11 with a maximum jail term of six months for this particular offense.

Chow is already serving two other prison terms for unlawful assembly linked to her involvement in organizing Tiananmen commemoration events.

Chow and two other former Alliance leaders, Lee Cheuk-yan and Albert Ho, were also charged with inciting subversion of state power under the national security law (NSL) in 2021.

Since the imposition of the NSL in the summer of 2020, after months of anti-government protests in Hong Kong, the semi-autonomous city has undergone dramatic changes.

Hundreds of pro-democracy politicians, activists and citizens have been arrested.

sri/sms (AP, AFP, Reuters)