Activist Joshua Wong, who became the global face of Hong Kong’s pro-democracy movement, was sentenced on Thursday to 10 years in jail on a charge of collusion with foreign entities under the city’s national security law.
Wong was among a group of young people whose protest efforts have effectively been outlawed by a sweeping national security law Beijing imposed on the Asian financial hub in 2020 after the sometimes violent demonstrations.
“The punishment must fit the gravity of the crime,” High Court Judge William Tam told a packed courtroom in delivering the sentence.
“It is also necessary for the court to express the community’s abhorrence of the defendant’s scheme and acts with others to collude with foreign forces or external elements to endanger national security.”
While the national security law was not retroactive, acts prior to it provided important context, including meetings with US and European politicians, Tam added.
The cases of Wong and others are being closely watched by international human rights groups and some Western countries tracking the implementation of the national security law in the former British colony.
WONG NODS TO PUBLIC GALLERY AHEAD OF SENTENCING
Wearing a blue shirt and dark-framed glasses, with a short back-and-sides haircut, Wong, flanked by three guards, nodded to the public gallery ahead of the sentencing.
He had been accused of conspiring with self-exiled activist Nathan Law and others to ask foreign countries, bodies, or individuals outside China to impose sanctions or blockades, or engage in other hostile activities against the government.
Wong, who pleaded guilty to the charge in September, has been repeatedly detained for his role in organising pro-democracy rallies.
Now 30, he has been in detention since November 2020, when he pleaded guilty to inciting and organising an unauthorised anti-government assembly during protests that roiled the Asian financial hub in 2019. He had been due for release next year.
Beijing said the law was necessary to stabilise the city.
‘BLACK HAND’ ACCUSATION
Wong’s meeting with politicians from the United States, Europe and elsewhere, has drawn the wrath of Beijing, which calls him a “black hand” of foreign forces.
The offences took place between July 1 and November 23, 2020, a time when Hong Kong was facing a high risk to its rule of law, the judge said.
At a September hearing, the prosecution highlighted what it called an international media and political campaign by Demosisto, a now-disbanded political party of which Wong was a leader that sought to bring sanctions and other hostile actions on Hong Kong and China in 2019 and 2020.
The group at one point also backed a referendum on Hong Kong’s sovereignty.
(Reuters)
