A Hong Kong teenager was ordered to spend four months in jail on Tuesday for insulting China’s national flag and an illegal assembly as Beijing increasingly targeted prominent financial center activists. Tony Chung, a 19-year-old who led an already disbanded pro-democracy group, was convicted earlier this month for throwing the Chinese flag on the ground during fights outside the Hong Kong legislature in May 2019.
While serving his sentence, Chung will be awaiting trial on a charge of “secession” that could get him a life sentence according to the draconian national security law Beijing imposed Hong Kong on June 30.
Chung was the first public political figure prosecuted under the new security law, which Beijing described as a “sword” for returning “order and stability” to the financial center after seven months of massive pro-democracy protests and often violent last year.
He was sentenced to three months each for insulting the national flag and illegal gathering, and was asked to serve four months behind bars.
Kin Cheung / AP
The teen also faces separate charges of money laundering and conspiracy to post seditious content.
Chung was arrested by plainclothes police in front of the U.S. consulate in late October and had since been arrested.
Speculation has stirred that authorities moved to Chung because he hoped to seek asylum at the U.S. consulate in Hong Kong.
A growing number of pro-democracy activists across the political spectrum have fled Hong Kong since Beijing stepped up cracking down on city protests against China’s authoritarian government.
Under the security law, dissenting speech can be alleged instead of acts of vague but serious crime such as “subversion” and “collusion with foreign forces.”
The law has also torn down the legal firewall between Hong Kong’s internationally recognized common law judicial system and the opaque, party-controlled justice system in mainland China, allowing the extradition of suspects across the border for trial.
Last Sunday, Chinese state television CGTN reported that Hong Kong police had put 30 people who are not currently in Hong Kong on their list of defendants on suspicion of violating national security law, including self-exiled activists Ted Hui and Baggio Leung.
Leading activists remaining in Hong Kong have been jailed, such as Joshua Wong and Agnes Chow, or face frequent arrests and multiple charges.
Democratic media mogul Jimmy Lai, also accused of national security law, has been arrested at home and stripped of public speeches (including his Twitter account) as the Hong Kong High Court granted provisional release last week.
The decision, however, provoked serious criticism from China, which threatened to extradite Lai to mainland for his trial.