Hong Kong police have arrested eight top pro-democracy figures on suspicion of unauthorised assembly during a July 1 protest, reports Hong Kong Free Press. Leung Kwok-hung, Figo Chan and Tang Sai-lai of the League of Social Democrats, and Eastern District Councillors Tsang Kin-sing, Andy Chui and Lancelot Chan were among those arrested on Tuesday morning by Hong Kong Island Regional Criminal Unit officers.
Ex-lawmaker Eddie Chu was arrested for organising and participating in the assembly at his residence. He was taken to Yuen Long police station and Pat Heung police station according to his Facebook page (below). The Democratic Party said on Facebook that their former chair Wu Chi-wai was also arrested for allegedly inciting and participating in the assembly. They cited a source saying that police showed a search warrant and took away clothes Wu was wearing on July 1.
Thousands participated in an assembly near Wan Chai and Causeway Bay on July 1, despite a police ban on the annual pro-democracy demonstration. It was banned for the first time in 17 years, amid the enactment of the national security law a day before and the Covid-19 pandemic. Over 370 people were arrested.
Figo Chan – then the vice-convenor of Civil Human Rights Front – told reporters on the day that they would insist on initiating the march despite a police ban. In a video livestreamed on Figo Chan’s Facebook page on Tuesday, an officer accused him of inciting others to take part and knowingly participate in an unauthorised assembly.
In a press release, the League of Social Democrats said that the police are seeking to cause a chilling effect by rounding up democrats, citizens and students en masse: “The mass arrest of democrats is undoubtedly retaliation against the US sanctioning of the 14 vice chairpersons of the National People’s Congress over [Beijing]’s disqualification of democrat lawmakers.”
Last week, a Hong Kong court jailed three ex-Demosisto activists on unauthorised assembly charges. Activists Joshua Wong, Agnes Chow and Ivan Lam were sentenced to 13.5 months, 10 months and seven months behind bars respectively. Media tycoon Jimmy Lai was denied bail over a charge of using his office for purposes other than stated on the lease. The 71-year-old has already been arrested under the National Security Law and accused of “colluding with foreign forces”.
China’s new security law ratified by the pro-China Hong Kong administration defines all pro-democracy protests as as secession, subversion, terrorism and collusion with foreign forces. If convicted, those arrested under the law face a life sentence. China contends that the draconian law which takes away the right to protests is crucial to restoring stability in the island after mass protests last year called for greater democracy. The protests were put down by brute force.
Pro-democracy politicians who stand disqualified now and several Western governments say the law is being used to suppress dissent and erode the wide-ranging freedoms guaranteed to Hong Kong when it was returned to Chinese rule in 1997 after more than a century as a British colony.
Aayush Pal 
Shobhil Shrivastava