A Hong Kong man who admitted guilt to sedition by donning a T-shirt with a protest message on it was given a 14-month prison sentence. The new municipal national security law was passed in March, and this is the first jail sentence the city’s court has issued under its new legislation.
The law, which goes by the name Article 23, is an extension of the 2020 Beijing-imposed national security law. Beijing and Hong Kong supported the law, claiming it was essential for stability, but others worried it would further erode personal liberties in the city. In June, Chu Kai-pong, a 27-year-old man, was detained at a subway station while donning a T-shirt that said, “Liberate Hong Kong, revolution of our times”.
Throughout the months-long anti-government protests in Hong Kong in 2019, both slogans were regularly heard. He reportedly had a box full of excrement with him, which he would use to intimidate opponents.
On June 12, the anniversary of a significant protest date in 2019 when unusually sizable people flocked to the city’s streets, Chu was taken into custody. Chu reportedly informed police, according to Reuters, that he wore the T-shirt to remind people of the protests.
This was heard in court. In a different occasion, he was previously imprisoned for three months for possessing other insulting materials and wearing a T-shirt bearing the same message.