Hong Kong Tiananmen vigil organisers convicted of incitement to subversion
Two leaders of the Hong Kong Alliance face up to 10 years in prison after being convicted under the national security law for organising the annual Tiananmen vigil, ending decades of public commemoration in the city.
Two prominent Hong Kong activists have been convicted of incitement to subversion for organising the city's annual Tiananmen vigil, a verdict that effectively closes the last public space in China where the 1989 crackdown could be commemorated. Lee Cheuk-yan, 69, and Chow Hang-tung, 41, both leaders of the Hong Kong Alliance, were found guilty on Friday under the territory's national security law and now face sentences of up to 10 years in prison.
The convictions mark the final chapter in the suppression of a tradition that had endured for three decades. For years, Hong Kong served as the only place in China, alongside Macau, where the anniversary of the 1989 pro-democracy protests in Beijing could be publicly marked. The huge annual vigil kept alive the memory of the protests and the violent crackdown that ended them, preserving a record of events that could not be acknowledged on the mainland. The 2019 vigil, held amid the territory's pro-democracy uprising, proved to be the last.
The national security law, imposed on Hong Kong in 2020, has been used to dismantle much of the civil society infrastructure that once flourished in the city. The Hong Kong Alliance, which had organised the vigil for decades, was among the groups targeted in the sweeping crackdown that followed the 2019 protests. Friday's verdict extends that campaign to the organisation's leadership, with prosecutors arguing that the act of remembrance itself constituted a threat to state security.
The case has drawn attention to the shrinking space for political expression in Hong Kong, a city that was promised a high degree of autonomy under the «one country, two systems» formula when it returned to Chinese rule in 1997. Critics of the national security law have long warned that its broad provisions would be used to criminalise dissent, and the convictions of Lee and Chow are seen as confirmation of those concerns. The two activists have indicated they will appeal, though legal observers note that appeals in national security cases have rarely succeeded.
The verdict also carries symbolic weight beyond Hong Kong's borders. The Tiananmen vigil was one of the few regular public events in the Chinese-speaking world that directly referenced the 1989 crackdown, and its disappearance removes a visible reminder of an episode that Beijing has sought to erase from public memory. For the diaspora and for human rights advocates, the silencing of the vigil represents a broader erosion of the freedoms that once distinguished Hong Kong from mainland China.
Lee Cheuk-yan, a veteran labour activist and former legislator, has been a fixture of Hong Kong's democratic movement for decades. Chow Hang-tung, a younger organiser, rose to prominence through her work with the Hong Kong Alliance. Both have remained publicly defiant since their arrest, insisting that commemorating a historical event is not a crime. Their sentencing is expected to take place in the coming weeks, with prosecutors likely to seek the maximum penalty given the political significance of the case.
