HONG KONG, Sept 16 (Askume) – A Hong Kong man pleaded guilty on Monday to sedition charges for wearing a T-shirt bearing a protest slogan, becoming the first person to be convicted under the city’s new national security law passed in March.
Zhu Qibang, 27, pleaded guilty to one count of “acting with seditious intent.”
Under the new national security law, the maximum punishment for the offence has been increased from two years to seven years in prison, with a maximum of 10 years in prison if found to have “collusion with foreign forces”.
Chu was arrested at an MTR station on 12 June, wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with the slogan “Liberate Hong Kong, the revolution of our times” and a yellow mask emblazoned with “FDNOL”, an acronym for “Five Demands, another slogan that stands for “One cannot live without the other”.
Both slogans were chanted repeatedly during massive and sometimes violent pro-democracy protests in 2019, with June 12 being a key starting day of months-long unrest.
The court heard that Zhu told police he wore the T-shirt to draw attention to the protests.
Chief Magistrate Su Zeli, who was chosen by city leader Li Jiachao to hear national security cases, adjourned the case until Thursday for sentencing.
When Hong Kong returned to China from Britain in 1997, Beijing promised to safeguard Hong Kong’s freedoms, including freedom of expression, under “one country, two systems”.
Following months of protests in the financial hub, Beijing imposed a national security law in 2020 that carries penalties of up to life imprisonment for acts of secession, subversion, terrorism or collusion with foreign powers.
In March 2024, Hong Kong passed its second new national security law, a local ordinance based on the core section of Hong Kong’s mini-constitution, the Basic Law, also known as “Article 23”.
Critics, including the US government, have expressed concerns about the new national security law, saying vaguely defined provisions on “sedition” could be used to suppress dissent.
Hong Kong and Chinese authorities say “loopholes” in the national security system need to be addressed.
