Hong Kong: "The future for defenders of freedoms is bleak"
Pro-democracy activists Ivan Lam and Joshua Wong arrive at Lai Chi Kok reception center in a prison van on December 2 after being sentenced to prison for unauthorized assembly near the police headquarters during anti -government meetings last year in Hong Kong.
REUTERS - TYRONE SIU
Text by: Heike Schmidt Follow
4 min
"The days to come will be hard, but we will continue our fight," Joshua Wong told judges this Wednesday morning in Hong Kong, after his conviction, along with two other pro democracy activists, to a prison sentence.
Joshua Wong, 24, was sentenced to 13 and a half months while his comrades Agnès Chow and Ivan Lam were sentenced to 10 and 7 months respectively for having demonstrated in front of the Hong Kong police headquarters in June 2019. Antoine Bondaz, a researcher at the Fondation de la Recherche Stratégique, looks back on these heavy penalties.
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With these relatively heavy sentences, the Hong Kong justice is sending a warning to other pro democracy activists?
Antoine Bondaz:
The political authorities in Hong Kong have been sending a message to the pro-democracy movement for several months now, in particular obviously with the adoption of the national security law.
This law does not precisely define certain crimes, creates legal uncertainty and worries demonstrators.
In the case of Joshua Wong, Agnes Chow and Ivan Lam, the law that was used is an older law, but the message is the same: Beijing wants to dissuade pro-democracy demonstrators from opposing the Hong Kong authorities head-on and ultimately to the Chinese authorities.
The three activists were accused of having chanted slogans hostile to the police. Amnesty International believes that the Hong Kong justice now criminalizes political opinions. What's your reading?
Antoine Bondaz:
Indeed, the demonstrations organized by Joshua, Agnès and Ivan were perfectly peaceful.
What they are accused of is having organized an illegal demonstration.
However, obviously, these demonstrations are organized precisely to denounce the stranglehold of Beijing on Hong Kong and therefore do not always take place within an authorized framework.
It is on this point that the three young demonstrators were condemned.
In court, Joshua Wong, the most famous of the convicts, launched
"the days to come will be hard, but we will continue our fight".
Haven't Beijing already succeeded in wiping out the movement, with the new national security law that criminalizes any act of secession, subversion, terrorism and collusion with foreign forces, with sentences ranging from ten years of life imprisonment?
Antoine Bondaz:
Let's be clear, with the extremely rapid adoption of this law, Beijing has scored some points.
Its objective is to erase the specificity of Hong Kong, particularly in terms of public freedoms.
On the other hand, a large part of the activists of this movement for democracy consider that it is necessary to continue to act.
But of course, their room for maneuver was considerably reduced, which led many activists to go abroad, especially to Europe.
Hundreds of young Hong Kong people have indeed chosen the path of exile. Will they be able to organize resistance outside the walls of Hong Kong?
Antoine Bondaz:
What is very important is that they try to raise awareness, particularly in the United States, Australia, Japan, Taiwan or even within the European Union.
We must be clear: Beijing will not go back on these decisions, but it is nevertheless extremely important for all democracies around the world to be outraged and to express their serious concern.
It should be remembered that this is not at all interference in the internal affairs of China.
The only request made of Beijing is to respect its international commitments and in particular the famous Sino-British joint declaration of 1984 which is registered at the UN.
The best known figures of the protest are behind bars, 11,000 other young people have been arrested and face trial, the local parliament no longer has any opponents. What future for those who fight to keep Hong Kong a free territory with justice and a political system independent from mainland China?
Antoine Bondaz:
The future for the defenders of Hong Kong's special status and civil liberties is obviously bleak.
The question now is how these young demonstrators can continue to organize to claim the fundamental freedoms that Beijing has promised them until 2047.
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Hong Kong: Joshua Wong and two other pro-democracy activists sentenced to prison