HK jails teenager for sedition and China flag insult
HONG KONG: A Hong Kong teenager was ordered to spend four months in prison on Tuesday for insulting China’s national flag and unlawful assembly as Beijing increasingly targets prominent activists from the city.
Tony Chung, a 19-year-old who led a now-disbanded prodemocracy group, was convicted earlier this month for throwing the Chinese flag to the ground during scuffles outside Hong Kong’s legislature in May 2019.
While serving his sentence, Chung will be waiting for trial over a charge of “secession”, which could land him life imprisonment according to the draconian national security law Beijing imposed on Hong Kong on 30 June.
Chung is the first public political figure prosecuted under the new security law.
He was sentenced to three months each for insulting the national flag and unlawful assembly, and told to serve four months behind bars. The teen is also facing separate charges of money laundering and conspiring to publish seditious content.
‘Activists plead guilty’
Relatives of the 10 Hong Kongers accused of fleeing the city by speedboat during a government crackdown on dissent say they’ve been informed that their family members pleaded guilty, according to a support group.
The families of the detainees were informed by court-appointed lawyers on Tuesday that a court in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen will deliver the verdicts on Wednesday, the 12 Hongkongers Concern Group said. It was not clear whether the 10 would also be sentenced on Wednesday, but Chinese courts often issue sentences at the same time as verdicts.