HONG KONG — A Hong Kong man pleaded guilty Monday to sedition for wearing a T-shirt bearing a protest slogan in the Chinese territory’s first conviction under new local national security legislation.
Chu Kai-pong, 27, was arrested at a subway station on June 12 wearing a T-shirt with the phrase “Liberate Hong Kong, revolution of our times.” He was also wearing a yellow mask that said “FDNOL,” which stands for “five demands, not one less.”
Both slogans and the color yellow were associated with mass pro-democracy protests in 2019 that roiled the international financial hub for months, and a Hong Kong court ruled in 2021 that the “Liberate Hong Kong” phrase was capable of inciting secession. Chu was arrested on the anniversary of an early clash between protesters and police in 2019.
Chu told police that he wore the T-shirt to remind people of the protests, the court heard, according to Reuters. He pleaded guilty to one count of “doing an act with a seditious intention.”
Chu was previously jailed for sedition for three months in January for wearing a T-shirt with the same “Liberate Hong Kong” slogan. He was arrested in November wearing the shirt at the Hong Kong airport.
In recent years, Hong Kong authorities have prosecuted a number of sedition cases under a revived colonial-era law that made the offense punishable by up to two years in prison. Sedition is generally defined as inciting hatred or contempt against the Chinese central government, the Hong Kong government or the judiciary.
In March, the opposition-free Hong Kong legislature unanimously approved a national security law that raised the maximum penalty to seven years and 10 years if an offense is found to have involved “collusion with foreign forces.”
Hong Kong was required by its mini-constitution to enact the law, called the Safeguarding National Security Ordinance but referred to informally as Article 23, but lawmakers had faced stiff public resistance.
Officials said the local legislation was necessary to close “loopholes” in a national security law that Beijing imposed in 2020, which did not cover sedition. The U.S. and others have criticized it as too vaguely worded.
Hong Kong and Chinese officials say both laws were necessary to restore stability after the protests, which sometimes turned violent. But critics say they have enabled a harsh crackdown on dissent in the former British colony, which was returned to Chinese rule in 1997 on the promise that its civil liberties would be preserved for 50 years.
Chu is set to be sentenced Thursday.
