In April, the 70th month since Beijing imposed the national security law, the Hong Kong government applied to the court to seize assets belonging to Apple Daily founder Jimmy Lai, who is serving a 20-year prison sentence.

On National Education Day, a top Chinese official delivered a warning about those who “politicised” the deadly Tai Po fire and tried to “stir up chaos” in the city.

Gov’t seeks to seize Jimmy Lai’s assets

The Hong Kong government filed an application with the High Court on April 2 to seize “offence-related” properties owned by jailed pro-democracy media tycoon Jimmy Lai on national security grounds.

In a statement issued the same day, the government mentioned Lai’s earlier convictions under the Beijing-imposed national security law. It said the High Court had found that he was the “mastermind and driving force behind the case, consciously using Apple Daily and his personal influence” to undermine local and Beijing authorities.

In a writ dated April 2, the secretary for justice listed HK$127 million in assets to be “forfeited” to the authorities.

The assets include credit balances in bank accounts belonging to or linked to the Apple Daily founder.

Fifteen bank accounts under Lai’s name – 10 with HSBC, two with Hang Seng Bank and three with Shanghai Commercial and Savings Bank – have over HK$32 million.

The government is also seeking to seize bank accounts belonging to 17 companies linked to Lai. It is also demanding that Lai give up shares in 17 companies, some of which overlap with the 17 firms whose assets the government is seeking to seize.

Among the companies whose assets and shares the government wants to seize are Dico Consultants Ltd, which has over HK$404,302 in its HSBC account, and Lai’s Hotel Properties Ltd, which has over HK$3.1 million in its four HSBC accounts.

Lai has been summoned to the High Court on July 8 to hear the government’s application. The case will be presided over by Esther Toh, one of the three judges who heard his national security trial.

The move to seize Lai’s assets came after the government designated three companies linked to Lai’s now-defunct Apple Daily tabloid “prohibited organisations” in late March and removed them from the corporate registry. Police cordoned off the Apple Daily building in Tseung Kwan O a day later.

The three firms were tried and convicted alongside the Apple Daily founder in his high-profile national security case. Lai was sentenced to 20 years behind bars in early February, while the companies were each fined over HK$3 million.

Political commentator appears in court

A Hong Kong political commentator charged with disclosing details of a national security investigation appeared at the District Court on April 28.

Wong Kwok-ngon, known by his pen name Wong On-yin, has been detained since his arrest in December for allegedly divulging in a YouTube video details of enquiries made by police during a national security investigation.

Judge Stanley Chan said the pre-trial review would take place behind closed doors on August 11, and the trial would begin on October 9.

Wong’s offence falls under the Safeguarding National Security Ordinance, a homegrown security law known as Article 23. It was added to the ordinance in May as part of subsidiary legislation, and Wong is the first to be charged under the new law.

He is also charged with sedition over videos posted on YouTube between January 3 and December 6 last year. He plans to plead not guilty to both charges.

The defendant, who continues to represent himself, told the court he had dropped his legal aid application.

Asked by the judge whether he had legal knowledge for self-defence, Wong said he had “three law degrees” and was confident of handling the case.

Nat. security clauses for restaurant licences

Secretary for Environment and Ecology Tse Chin-wan said in early April that all Hong Kong restaurant licences would include national security clauses from September.

Tse made the remarks on April 7, nearly a year after the Food and Environmental Hygiene Department (FEHD) introduced the provisions for restaurant licence renewals in May.

“With restaurants renewing their licences gradually, we expect that by September this year, all restaurant licences will contain the clauses,” Tse told reporters, according to RTHK.

Retiree jailed over seditious Facebook posts

A Hong Kong man was jailed for a year under the city’s homegrown national security law after pleading guilty to making seditious remarks on Facebook, including comments supporting Hong Kong’s and Taiwan’s independence.

Raymond Chong pleaded guilty before national security judge Victor So at West Kowloon Magistrates’ Courts on April 14 to one count of knowingly publishing publications with a seditious intention – an offence under the city’s local security law, also known as Article 23.

The magistrate handed Chong, a retiree in his early 60s, an 18-month sentence but discounted it by six months after considering his guilty plea.

Chong was accused of making 53 seditious social media posts between March 2024 and November 2025, local media reported.

The posts had wording such as “dissolving the Chinese Communist Party is the most important thing” and “Hong Kong independence is within sight.”

The defendant posted on a public Facebook page called “Holy Raymond,” which features the Chinese phrase “Heaven will destroy the Chinese Communist Party, God bless Hong Kong” as its profile picture.

During mitigation ahead of sentencing, his lawyer argued that Chong was a Falun Gong believer who had come to hate the Chinese Communist Party because of false information that the CCP engaged in live organ harvesting.

Beijing official warned of ‘politicising’ Tai Po fire

China’s top official in charge of Hong Kong affairs warned of some people who “politicised” the deadly Tai Po fire and tried to use the disaster to “stir up chaos” in Hong Kong.

Xia Baolong, director of the Hong Kong and Macao Affairs Office, delivered his remarks on April 15 via a recorded video shown at a National Security Education Day ceremony.

In his speech, Xia mentioned the massive fire that broke out at Wang Fuk Court, a government-subsidised housing estate in Tai Po, on November 26, killing 168 people.

“After the Tai Po fire, some malicious people politicised the tragedy, attempting to use the disaster as a means to disrupt Hong Kong,” Xia said in Mandarin, without giving further details.

“Once again, it reminds us that along Hong Kong’s path toward prosperity under good governance, there will be various risks and challenges.”

Speaking at the same event, Hong Kong Chief Executive John Lee also warned that some people were “using the disaster to stir up chaos” and “to incite hatred” in Hong Kong.

“Only through the government’s swift action and decisive law enforcement has the situation been able to return to normal,” Lee said in Mandarin.

French journalist denied entry to city

A French journalist was denied entry to Hong Kong in November, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) said in late April, accusing the city’s authorities of “weaponising visas” against foreign media workers.

Antoine Vedeilhe, who was shooting a documentary for French public broadcaster France Télévisions, was questioned upon arrival at Hong Kong International Airport on November 2 last year, RSF said in a statement on April 24.

He was detained for three hours before being deported without being given a reason, it added.

The press freedom NGO said Vedeilhe was the 13th foreign media worker who had been denied entry or a visa by the city’s authorities following Beijing’s imposition of the national security law in 2020.

“In the journalist’s view, his detention was a reprisal for his work on a documentary examining Beijing’s grip on Hong Kong,” RSF said.

Another cameraman for the documentary was able to enter the city, RSF said, but he was followed by “unidentified individuals that he suspects were Hong Kong’s national security police.”

“In the following days, there was a hacking attempt on Vedeilhe’s private email account and his sources in the documentary were harassed by the national security police,” the NGO said.

In an emailed reply to HKFP’s enquiries, the Hong Kong government said it “strongly condemns the smearing remarks and distorted narratives by” RSF.

Prosecution and arrests figures

As of April 1, a total of 394 people have been arrested for “cases involving suspected acts or activities that endanger national security” since Beijing’s national security law came into effect, according to the Security Bureau. That figure includes those arrested under Article 23 and for other offences.

Of the 208 people and five companies that have so far been charged, 180 people and four companies have been convicted or are awaiting sentencing.

In total, 100 people and four companies have been charged under Beijing’s national security law, with 79 persons and three companies convicted. Thirteen people have been charged under Article 23, 10 of whom have been convicted.

Three people who were arrested by national security police over alleged illegal weapons training last December have been charged with conspiracy to commit subversion.

Students Wong Kit-lun, 20, and Tang Ngai-pok, 23, as well as waiter Chan Hiu-chun, 23, appeared at West Kowloon Magistrates’ Courts on Thursday.

They are among a group of 10 people arrested in December for alleged “unlawful drilling” – an offence under the Safeguarding National Security Ordinance.

They stood in the defendant dock beside Gallian Pang and Lee Chun-sum, who were charged with the same offence of conspiring to subvert state power – an offence under the Beijing-imposed national security law – a week after the arrests. At the time they were charged in December, both Pang and Lee were security guards aged 24 and 25 respectively.

On Thursday, the prosecution accused Wong, Tang and Chan of conspiring with Pang, Lee and “other persons unknown between November 1, 2024 to December 11, 2025 to organise, plan, commit or participate in acts to subvert the state power.”

Wong faced an additional charge of possession of child pornography, an offence under the Prevention of Child Pornography Ordinance.

The prosecution also announced that it was charging Lee for allegedly possessing explosives and radio communications apparatus without a licence.

Possession of explosives is punishable by a maximum of 14 years’ imprisonment, while possession of radio communications apparatus without a licence is punishable by up to two years’ imprisonment.

In a statement published on Thursday, the government said the December arrests were made after investigation revealed a “syndicate” that “conducted firearms drills, knife techniques, and martial arts combat in a unit of an industrial building in Kowloon.”

Their aim was to subvert state power by means or threat of force, “i.e., to overthrow [Hong Kong’s] organs of power,” the government said.

The arrests marked the first time authorities had invoked the unlawful drilling offence.

The remaining arrestees in the case who were not charged have been released on bail. They are required to report to the police in mid-June, the statement added.

Conspiring to commit subversion, an offence under the national security law, is punishable by up to life imprisonment in Hong Kong.

A Hong Kong man who threw anti-government leaflets from his public housing flat has been sentenced to 10 months in prison after pleading guilty to committing seditious acts.

Raymond Wong appeared at the West Kowloon Magistrates’ Court on Tuesday to receive a 10-month jail sentence handed down by Chief Magistrate Victor So for two counts of “doing with a seditious intention an act or acts that had a seditious intention,” local media reported.

Wong, a 55-year-old construction worker, admitted to throwing the leaflets from his unit in On Tat Estate, Kwun Tong, on two occasions in October 2024 and December 2025.

He was arrested in April, and the following month, he pleaded guilty to the charges –  an offence under Hong Kong’s homegrown national security law, also known as Article 23.

In mitigation, he apologised to his girlfriend and his daughter, as their public housing unit would be reclaimed by the government due to his offence.

Citing a psychological report, Wong’s lawyers said that the defendant did not know how to control the resentment that had built up from losing his full-time job after the 2019 protests and the Covid-19 pandemic.

‘Premeditated and planned’

Noting that the leaflets were thrown after National Day two years ago and before last year’s Legislative Council (LegCo) elections, Magistrate So said that Wong’s actions were “premeditated and planned to some degree.”

On October 2, 2024, Kwun Tong district councillor Hsu Yau-wai reported 41 sheets of paper to the police after finding them on the podium of Lai Tat House at the estate. The papers had slogans on them saying “kill police” and derogatory remarks about mainland Chinese people.

On December 5 last year, two days ahead of the “patriots only” LegCo polls, a property manager found papers scattered near that same area, with written slogans such as “Liberate Hong Kong, do not vote.”

Wong’s lawyers said on Tuesday that his methods were “primitive” and had limited impact compared with online posts.

So said he accepted the defence’s argument but pointed out that Wong explicitly incited people to kill police officers, mainland Chinese, and government officials.

Wong incited enmity towards the police and referred to mainland residents with “derogatory” and “dehumanising” language, and his use of the slogan “Liberate Hong Kong,” considered secessionist under Beijing’s national security law in Hong Kong, also challenged national sovereignty, the magistrate added.

Calls to boycott the LegCo polls also amounted to an effort to undermine public confidence in the city’s electoral system, So said.

The turnout for last year’s polls was the second-lowest on record, at 31.9 per cent. Beijing overhauled the city’s electoral system in 2021 to ensure that only those deemed patriotic enough can run.

The move reduced democratic representation in the legislature, tightened control of elections and introduced requirements for candidates to obtain nominations from a small circle of political elites.

A Hong Kong government proposal that will allow the city’s leader to certify criminal acts as national security offences is intended to “make the law clear,” Chief Executive John Lee has said.

Speaking at a press conference on Tuesday, Lee said the new subsidiary legislation for Hong Kong’s homegrown national security law, the Safeguarding National Security Ordinance, commonly known as Article 23, “is purely to make the law even clearer.”

Shortly after, Lee approved the subsidiary legislation during a meeting with the Executive Council, the city’s top decision-making body.

Under the new law, which was gazetted and came into effect the same day, the chief executive will be able to certify “other offences endangering national security.”

Criminal cases classified as endangering national security will have tougher court procedures, such as a higher bar for bail and trial before designated judges.

“The purpose of introducing the subsidiary legislation is to make it clear, make it much, much clearer, how offences… endangering national security under the law of Hong Kong will be so classified,” Lee told reporters on Tuesday.

“It is not intended and will not expand the definition of the offences, and it’s not adding any new offences or any new powers or punishments. It also does not expand the scope of the application of the law,” he added.

‘Sensitive’ information

Lee said the new piece of legislation would reduce “controversy or debate in court” about what constitutes national security offences.

Asked whether he was concerned about giving an impression of further centralising power into his hands, Lee said the city’s chief executive must shoulder the “important responsibility” of safeguarding national security.

Lee said he would exercise the new power with “prudence and seriousness,” but added that, as city leader, he has access to exclusive information regarding threats to national security.

A lot of activities endangering national security “are committed by state players of another place. They are professional, sophisticated, and the series of information that may be available to indicate the seriousness of the matters [is] privy to the chief executive,” he said.

“A lot of this information is sensitive and not suitable for public disclosure,” he added.

Under the government proposal, the certificate issued by the chief executive will be binding on the city’s courts and cannot be challenged.

Speaking to reporters on Monday, Secretary for Justice Paul Lam said the designation of national security offences involves “highly confidential” information that would not be available to the courts.

“The judiciary would not be capable of making such a decision,” Lam said.

Asked whether the chief executive’s certificates will be announced, Lam only said “people will know” as court proceedings are open to the public.

“If you see designated judges or other special arrangements in a trial, you will know” that the case has been designated as relating to national security, he said.

A 55-year-old man has pleaded guilty to making and distributing “seditious” materials, including ones that called for a boycott of the “patriots only” legislative elections last year.

Raymond Wong, a construction worker, was charged and brought to the West Kowloon Magistrates’ Courts on Thursday afternoon.

He was arrested by national security police on April 21, a government statement said on Thursday. His arrest was not known to the public before, as police did not issue information about it at the time.

Wong was charged with two counts of “doing with a seditious intention an act or acts that had a seditious intention,” an offence under Hong Kong’s homegrown national security law, also known as Article 23.

According to a court document, Wong allegedly made “paper sheets written with statements” and threw them “into a public space” from a 12th-floor flat in On Tat Estate, a public housing estate in Kwun Tong. The first count of the sedition offence was dated October 2, 2024, and the second one was dated December 5, 2025.

Local media reported that on October 2, 2024, a Kwun Tong district councillor found pieces of paper with phrases including “blow up corrupt police officers” scattered on the estate’s podium. The district councillor called the police and handed over 41 sheets of paper.

On December 5 last year, two days before the “patriots only” Legislative Council elections, a staff member at the estate’s property management company found sheets of paper reading “liberate Hong Kong, do not vote,” also on the estate’s podium.

Police were called, and they seized 16 pieces of paper with seditious phrases. Wong’s fingerprints were found on two of them.

Wong’s case was adjourned to June 9 for sentencing to await his background report, a social welfare report and a psychological report.

Sedition is punishable by up to seven years in jail. If the defendant is found to have colluded with an “external force” when committing the offence, they face a maximum of 10 years behind bars.

Jail terms handed down at the magistrate’s court, however, are capped at two years, or three when a defendant is convicted of more than one offence.

The maximum penalty for sedition was increased in March 2024, when lawmakers passed Article 23. Before that, it was punishable by up to two years, when sedition fell under a colonial-era ordinance.

Two Hong Kong officials have condemned “groundless accusations” against a recent update to the city’s homegrown national security law, which empowers the chief executive to certify any criminal case as a national security offence.

Secretary for Security Chris Tang told the Legislative Council (LegCo) on Thursday afternoon that he noticed some people had misunderstood or “deliberately misinterpreted” the subsidiary legislation.

They tried to intimidate the public by claiming that the subsidiary law would widen the scope of national security offences, turning minor offences into national security crimes, he said.

The security chief called the accusations “false, misleading, deceptive, and scaremongering” and said some people were attempting to incite hatred towards the government.

“Some people delivered alarmist remarks, saying that the government can randomly certify any acts of the public as national security offences. Those people may have ulterior motives or are cruel-hearted, hoping to incite others’ hatred of the HKSAR,” Tang said in Cantonese.

Also speaking at LegCo, Secretary for Justice Paul Lam said he noticed “some media outlets with ulterior motives, foreign forces, and fugitives” had made “groundless accusations” against the national security law.

The two ministers delivered their remarks during LegCo’s first meeting to review the Safeguarding National Security (Procedural Matters) Regulation, a subsidiary legislation of the homegrown national security law, commonly known as Article 23.

Authorities enacted the subsidiary law through the “negative vetting” mechanism, which allows the law to be gazetted and to take effect before legislative scrutiny.

The law came into effect on Tuesday, one day after the government tabled the bill in LegCo.

Lam, the justice chief, said that the subsidiary legislation was necessary to further explain articles in the Beijing-imposed national security law and Article 23, which stipulate that the chief executive should have the power to determine whether a criminal case involves national security.

In its proposal, the government cited the “legislative intent” of the Beijing-imposed national security law, saying that offences endangering national security include not only the four types of offences under the national security law, but also “other offences endangering national security under the law of the HKSAR.”

Lam said the recent legislative update was intended to further define “other offences endangering national security under the law of the HKSAR,” and it did not introduce any new power or new offences.

Earlier on Tuesday, Chief Executive John Lee said the new subsidiary legislation “is purely to make the law even clearer.”

The Hong Kong government has proposed allowing the chief executive to certify any criminal act as a national security case, in a legal update that would be binding on the courts.

New subsidiary legislation under Article 23 – Hong Kong’s homegrown national security ordinance – will empower the city’s leader to certify “other offences endangering national security under the law of the HKSAR,” according to a proposal submitted to the Legislative Council (LegCo) on Monday by the Security Bureau and the Department of Justice.

The government proposed that the subsidiary legislation would be enacted through a “negative vetting” procedure, allowing it to be gazetted before being tabled at LegCo for scrutiny. It cited a “complicated geopolitical landscape” for the update.

The “legislative intent” of the Beijing-imposed national security law, which came into effect on June 30, 2020, is that offences endangering national security include not only the four types of offences under the Beijing-imposed national security law but also “other offences endangering national security under the law of the HKSAR,” the government’s proposal said.

The chief executive is already empowered to issue certificates to decide whether an act involves national security, but the new subsidiary legislation aims to “bring greater certainty” to the courts. There will no longer be room to debate whether an ordinary crime could face national security procedures when a certificate is issued.

Plus, later offences connected to an act classified as a national security offence would also face national security procedures, under the new plan.

“The subsidiary legislation does not involve the creation of any new criminal offence, penalty or enforcement power,” the document said.

‘Any act’ can be reclassified

Under the proposal, the chief executive will be granted the power to declare that any act involved in a criminal offence case concerns national security. The leader may then issue a certificate: “[T]hen the case is a case concerning [an] offence endangering national security” under the Beijing-imposed national security law or Article 23,” the proposal says.

“If a person is charged with any offence endangering national security, and is charged with or convicted of any alternative offence in respect of the same act in the same case, such alternative offence is also an offence endangering national security.”

Once a case, or an offence, is certified as endangering national security, the procedures stipulated in Article 23 or the national security law for handling such cases will be applicable.

The national security law allows handpicked judges and closed-door hearings for national security cases, trials without juries, and a higher bar for bail.

The Panel on Security and the Panel on Administration of Justice and Legal Services will hold a joint meeting later on Monday to discuss the proposed subsidiary legislation.

Ming Pao reported on Sunday that some lawmakers were notified that such a meeting would be held the following day.