Three former members of a Hong Kong group that organized annual vigils to commemorate China’s 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre have been sentenced to four and a half months in jail for failing to comply with a request for information under a Beijing-imposed national security law. Chow Hang-tung, 38, a prominent Hong Kong pro-democracy activist and former vice chairperson of the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China, was sentenced alongside co-defendants Tang Ngok-kwan and Tsui Hon-kwong at a magistrate’s court on Saturday. The now-disbanded alliance was the main organizer of Hong Kong’s June 4 candlelight vigil for victims of China’s Tiananmen Square, where Chinese troops and tanks were deployed against peaceful pro-democracy protests.
Magistrate Peter Law announced the custodial sentence that fell short of the six-month maximum jail term allowed for the charge, stating that “national security is cardinally important to public interests and the whole nation.” The national security law under which they were prosecuted criminalizes secession, subversion, and collusion with foreign forces to intervene in the city’s affairs as well as terrorism. Many pro-democracy activists were silenced or jailed after its enactment in 2020.
The alliance was accused by prosecutor Ivan Cheung of being a “foreign agent” for an unidentified organization after allegedly receiving HK$20,000 ($2,562.69) in funding. Tang and Tsui were both granted bail pending appeal, while Chow remained in custody on Saturday awaiting trial in a separate national security case.
Speaking before sentencing on Saturday, Chow was defiant, criticizing what she described as the “political” nature of the case and the decision of the court to withhold key facts. “We will continue doing what we have always done, that is to fight falsehood with truth, indignity with dignity, secrecy with openness, madness with reason, division with solidarity. We will fight these injustices wherever we must, be it on the streets, in the courtroom, or from a prison cell,” said Chow from the dock in a speech that was interrupted several times by Law.
In a separate case, Elizabeth Tang, a veteran labor activist who was arrested in Hong Kong for endangering national security earlier this week, was released on bail on Saturday. “I feel clueless because my work is always about labor rights and organizing trade unions. So I don’t understand why I was accused of breaking the law and endangering national security,” she told reporters after being released.
In a statement on Thursday that did not provide a name, police said they had arrested a 65-year-old woman on Hong Kong Island for suspected collusion with a foreign country or with external elements to endanger national security. It said she was being detained for investigation.