Eight Hong Kong pro-democracy activists have been sentenced to as much as 14 months in jail on Monday for organising, participating in and inciting participation in a banned vigil final yr for victims of China’s 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown.
The former British colony, which returned to Chinese rule in 1997 with the promise of wide-ranging freedoms, historically holds the most important June 4 vigil on the planet, however police have rejected purposes for the final two vigils, citing coronavirus restrictions.
Critics mentioned authorities used the pandemic restrictions as an excuse to dam the commemoration. The metropolis authorities rejected that.
The sentencing is the most recent blow to town’s democracy motion, which has seen dozens of activists arrested, jailed or flee the Chinese-ruled territory since Beijing imposed a sweeping nationwide safety regulation final yr.
Judge Amanda Woodcock mentioned the defendants “ignored and belittled a genuine public health crisis” and “wrongly and arrogantly believed” in commemorating June 4 fairly than defending the well being of the neighborhood.
Media tycoon Jimmy Lai, 74, who’s already in jail, barrister Chow Hang Tung, 36, and activist Gwyneth Ho, 31, acquired sentences of 13, 12 and 6 months, respectively. They have been discovered responsible by the courtroom final Thursday.
The three, the best profile of the eight, had pleaded not responsible to all expenses. learn extra
“If commemorate (sic) those who died because of injustice is a crime, then inflict on me that crime and let me suffer the punishment of this crime, so I may share the burden and glory of those young men and women who shed their blood on June 4th to proclaim truth, justice and goodness,” Lai mentioned in a mitigation letter, handwritten in jail, forward of sentencing.
Chow, in her mitigation mentioned: “If those in power had wished to kill the movement with prosecution and imprisonment, they shall be sorely disappointed. Indeed what they have done is breathe new life into the movement, rallying a new generation to this long struggle for truth, justice and democracy.”
Five others who had pleaded responsible, together with Lee Cheuk-yan, chief of the now-disbanded vigil organiser Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China, have been sentenced to between simply over 4 months and 14 months.
“If there was a provocateur, it is the regime that fired at its own people,” an emotional Lee, who acquired the best sentence of 14 months, informed the courtroom on Nov. 17.
“If I must go to jail to affirm my will, then so be it.”
All sentences will probably be served concurrently with any the defendants are already going through in different instances.
Sixteen different activists are already serving sentences of 4-10 months associated to the 2020 vigil. Two democracy campaigners going through related expenses over the vigil, Nathan Law and Sunny Cheung, have fled Hong Kong.
After mass pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong in 2019, the worldwide monetary hub has taken a swift authoritarian flip with Beijing’s imposition of a sweeping nationwide safety regulation final yr impacting many facets of life within the metropolis.
China has by no means supplied a full account of the 1989 crackdown on protest there that centred on Beijing’s Tiananmen Square.
The dying toll given by officers days later was about 300, most of them troopers, however rights teams and witnesses say 1000’s of protesters might have been killed.
