Chow Hang-tung, a 41-year-old barrister and one of Hong Kong’s most prominent pro-democracy activists, was convicted of inciting subversion on Friday alongside co-defendant Lee Cheuk-yan. Both face maximum sentences of 10 years in jail when sentenced later this year. The pair have been detained for nearly five years pending trial over their roles organizing an annual vigil commemorating the Tiananmen Square massacre.
Chow was arrested in September 2021 along with two other organizers of the now-disbanded Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Democratic Movements of China. The annual vigil, which previously drew tens of thousands of participants, was prohibited in 2020 under pandemic control measures. All three arrested organizers were charged with incitement to subversion under Hong Kong’s national security law, implemented by Beijing in 2020. While Chow and Lee pleaded not guilty, the third defendant Albert Ho submitted a guilty plea.
During her imprisonment, Chow has written extensively on topics ranging from personal observations about prison conditions to philosophical essays on civil rights and freedom of speech. Her writings have been translated and circulated, and her social media profiles, managed on her behalf, are regularly updated with her prison correspondence. She has received multiple human rights awards and maintains a prominent public profile despite her incarceration. A Hong Kong government spokesperson stated that prosecutions were based on criminal conduct rather than political considerations.
Chow’s activism stems partly from her experience volunteering in Sichuan province following a devastating 2008 earthquake. Originally a natural sciences student at Cambridge University specializing in seismology, she subsequently pursued legal training to become a barrister and devoted herself to human rights work. Her case represents one of the final high-profile national security trials in Hong Kong as the security law framework continues to reshape the territory’s political landscape.
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