Three activists who organized Tiananmen vigil in Hong Kong jailed

Hong Kong, Mar 11 (EFE).- Three prominent former members of a group that organized the annual vigil in Hong Kong in remembrance of the victims of China’s Tiananmen Square crackdown were sentenced Saturday to four and a half months in prison for not complying with a national security police request for information.

Chow Hang-tung, Tang Ngok-kwan and Tsui Hon-kwong of the now disbanded Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China (HKA) appeared before Magistrate Judge Peter Law in West Kowloon Magistrates’ Court on Saturday and were found guilty of failing to comply with a request by the police for information.

Under the national security law approved by Beijing for Hong Kong in 2020, the local police chief can require certain groups to provide information, including financial information, after receiving the Hong Kong secretary for security’s approval.

The HKA was charged by prosecutor Ivan Cheung with acting as a “foreign agent” for an unidentified organization and allegedly receiving HK$20,000 ($2,562) from it.

The detainees were part of the standing committee of the HKA, which was responsible for the annual candlelight vigils held in the city’s center in memory of the victims of the Tiananmen massacre in China in 1989.

Chow was arrested in June 2021 on suspicion of promoting an assembly prohibited under the provisions of local Public Order regulations.

The HKA tried to get the police ban lifted so they could hold the vigil again and, failing to receive the support of the appeals board, asked its supporters not to gather in central Victoria Park, where it takes place every year. EFE

msc/pd