[ad_1]
“Even if we have tough days ahead, we won’t let ourselves fall,” Hong Kong activist Joshua Wong, 24, shouts as he is led out of the classroom. “Absolutely no regrets,” says his colleague Ivan Lam, 26. Agnes Chow, 23, is silent, looking tired and depressed. When the verdict was announced, she burst into tears.
About 100 supporters gathered outside the West Kowloon Magistrates’ Court on Wednesday afternoon. They are waiting for the prison bus that is supposed to take them away, they can’t get close to their comrades. Many are agitated, shout slogans, find the judgments too harsh.
Judge Wong Sze-lai sentenced defendants Wong, Lam and Chow to thirteen and a half months, seven months and ten months in prison – sentences well above previously anticipated. Hong Kong’s leading criminal law expert, Eric Cheung, had held the suspended sentence and, in Agnes Chow’s case, had even considered community service possible. However, in the grounds for the verdict, the judge held that only a “deterrent effect” could be obtained with imprisonment.
Figureheads of a resistant protest culture
It is a day of bitter symbolism for the Hong Kong democratic movement, with Wong, Lam and Chow among their most famous faces. Despite their young age, they have been at the forefront of the dispute over what kind of city Hong Kong should be for nearly a decade. They have become leading figures in a resilient protest culture that the Chinese leadership wants to stifle.
No Ride to Freedom: Prison Bus at West Kowloon Magistrates’ Court
Photo: JEROME FAVRE / EPA-EFE / Shutterstock
The trio met as teenagers:
-
They first appeared in public in 2012, when they were young activists who campaigned against a curriculum designed to instill pro-Chinese “patriotism” in Hong Kong students.
-
During the so-called umbrella movement two years later, Joshua Wong in particular became an internationally renowned spokesperson. His role in these protests has earned him and Ivan Lam prison terms in the past.
-
Most recently, the three friends were co-chairs of Demosisto, until they dissolved the opposition organization in June, hours before the so-called State Security Act went into effect.
The current trial against the three revolved around the incidents of June 21, 2019, when protesters besieged the Hong Kong police headquarters to protest police violence. Joshua Wong had called for the protest.
“I was there that day too,” said Fernando Cheung, Wong’s mentor and until recently a Hong Kong MP. “Thousands had arrived, it was basically peaceful, but at the edge of the rally the demonstrators had surrounded a police car and were starting to hit the windows. Like other local parliamentarians, I tried to alleviate the situation, but the atmosphere had changed since 2014 “.
While the umbrella movement was still geared towards leadership figures, the 2019 movement organized itself decentralized via social media like Telegram and refused to be controlled by individuals, not even Joshua Wong. “We both learned that in those days last year,” says his friend Cheung.
“Immediate imprisonment is the only reasonable option”
Prosecutors have now accused Wong, Lam and Chow of inciting others to attend this unauthorized meeting. With Wong the organization of the same was added, with Chow the participation. The three had pleaded guilty on all counts, knowing that a confession would earn them a one-third of their prison sentence. His defense attorneys had asked for tolerance.
Judge Wong Sze-lai did not allow that rule to prevail: the defendants did not request protests impulsively, but rather “after careful consideration”, and Wong and Chow led the crowd. It could have easily led to clashes with the police, the judge said, but fortunately no one was injured. “Immediate imprisonment is the only reasonable option,” he said.
As overwhelming as the sentences are, the judge has not exhausted the range of sentences. Public order disturbances in Hong Kong are classified as an unauthorized rally as in the case of Wong, Lam and Chow, an illegal rally or a riot.
The maximum penalties are three, five and ten years respectively. In the past, however, violations of the smallest of these offenses were often not prosecuted at all, as law professor Eric Cheung points out: “Participants in unapproved meetings received only warnings. It happened very often during student protests. “
In previous trials against protest movement participants, it has not been proven that Hong Kong’s traditionally highly respectable judiciary decides unilaterally against activists. The judges are under pressure from two sides, says attorney Albert Ho, who became known far beyond the city in 2013 as legal counsel to US whistleblower Edward Snowden. On the one hand, there are the governments of Hong Kong and Beijing and the Hong Kong press, which is loyal to Beijing. On the other hand there is the international community: “Our judges obviously note: the world expects them to act fairly”.
For the three friends such considerations do not play a role at first, they must be arrested immediately. This is especially bitter for Agnes Chow, unlike the two men, she was sentenced to prison for the first time. He does not tolerate pre-trial detention well, friends report that he suffers from insomnia.
Joshua Wong also had unpleasant experiences while in custody. After his detention, he had to undergo a full body scan, which Hong Kong law enforcement agencies give him to criminals, to track down drug packages that were ingested. “They say the scan showed a ‘shadow’ on his abdomen,” says his mentor Fernando Cheung. Wong was placed in solitary confinement in a hospital room with the lights on 24 hours a day for several days.
It is absurd, Cheung says, that the authorities have examined Wong’s abdomen of all people. After all, the decisive part of his body is the head.
Source link
