Seen on a Lennon Wall in 2019
"A Hong Kong man was denied bail under the city’s new domestic security law after he allegedly wore a t-shirt with a banned protest slogan and a yellow mask". Thus began a report in the Hong Kong Free Press about an individual whose arrest on Wednesday (June 12th) only came to be known by many yesterday (June 14th).
"Defendant Chu Kai-pong, 27, was brought to the West Kowloon Magistrates’ Courts on Friday to face one count of “doing with a seditious intention an act or acts that had a seditious intention.” He was also charged with failing to show his proof of identity to the police and loitering with intent, the report continued.
"According to the charge sheet, Chu was intercepted by the police on Wednesday near Shek Mun MTR station. He was said to have worn a top and a mask printed with statements that were allegedly intended to incite hatred, contempt or disaffection against the “fundamental system of the state established by the Constitution of the People’s Republic of China.”"
Note: Wednesday was June 12th -- the fifth anniversary of the day back in 2019 when the riot police fired over 150 cannisters of tear gas into a large crowd assembled at Admiralty with the intention of surrounding the Legislative Council complex to protest the anti-extradition bill. And also brutally beat up unarmed individuals in the crowd. In full view of media and other cameras.
"Local media reported on Friday that Chu’s t-shirt contained the 2019 protest slogan “Liberate Hong Kong, revolution of our times,” which was ruled as being capable of carrying secessionist connotations in the city’s first national security law trial in 2021." Arrests related to that particular slogan were first made in July 2020 -- very soon after the national security law that China imposed on Hong Kong being in effect.
"Chu was also wearing a yellow mask printed with the words “FDNOL.” The phrase is considered an acronym of “Five Demands, Not One Less,” also a slogan from the 2019 extradition bill protests which laid out the movement’s demands."
Note: If "Five Demands, Not One Less" is considered illegal, it's newly so -- and this would be the first time that someone was arrested with regards to it. And, frankly, this is a "development" I find extremely disturbing as it represents a further level of restriction of free speech along with what appears to be a (deliberate) misrepresentation of a pretty moderate set of demands as ones that are inflammatory, even revolutionary.
Something else not mentioned in the Hong Kong Free Press piece (but was reported earlier in the year): Chu Kai-pong was previously arrested at Hong Kong International Airport last November. At the time, he was wearing a T-shirt with the "Liberate Hong Kong, revolution of our times” slogan printed on it and found to be in possession of flags that bore similar slogans.
For this, he was sentenced to three months jail in January. Which would mean that he was out of jail by April at the latest. So it seems he's a repeated offender in this regard and the police appear to have targeted him.
The former is something that could be said about the majority of Article 23 arrestees (who include "Grandma" Alexandra Wong this past June 4th) thus far while the latter is something that seems to be the case with all of them. Which gives credence to my suspicion that in contemporary Hong Kong, it's a matter of "If they want to get you, they'll get you with some law or other". So one can only hope that one's not among the "extremely small minority" that the national security laws are meant to target!
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