A Hong Kong Tiananmen vigil activist standing in a national security trial has urged the court to safeguard the “dignity and bottom line of the law,” as she warned judges not to become “accomplices” in an alleged government crackdown on free speech.

Chow Hang-tung, a former leader of the now-defunct Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China, said that authorities have been “reshaping” the city’s long-held values by prosecuting activists who advocate for democracy in China.

Her statement to the court was made on Tuesday as the prosecution and the defence completed their closing arguments. The three-judge panel said they hope to deliver a verdict in “mid or late July.”

Chow is representing herself in the trial, in which she faces a charge of inciting subversion under the Beijing-imposed national security law alongside the Alliance and Lee Cheuk-yan, another former leader of the group. The offence carries a maximum penalty of 10 years behind bars.

Prosecutors accuse the Alliance of inciting others to topple the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) through its calls to “end one-party rule” in China, a key tenet of the group since its founding in 1989 after the Tiananmen crackdown in Beijing.

Delivering closing arguments on Tuesday, Chow said the crux of the case was whether the law protects the “perpetual rule” of the CCP or the rights of people to advocate democracy.

“Ending one-party rule means putting an end to the status quo, in which those in power are not bound by the law,” she said in Cantonese.

‘Unheard of’

Prosecutors previously argued that the Alliance’s calls breached China’s constitution, after a 2018 amendment stipulated that the CCP’s leadership is the “defining feature” of the country’s “fundamental” socialist system.

Chow argued on Tuesday that the CCP’s leadership is merely “symbolic” under China’s constitution, as the text has not demarcated the party’s power and function.

“King Charles III is also the leader of his country, but he has no real power,” she said, drawing an analogy to the UK’s constitutional monarchy.

Instead, it is a reality that the CCP is in power, she said. The Alliance’s advocacy aimed at creating “favourable conditions” for the country’s democratisation, not toppling the regime, she added.

She argued it was “unheard of” that a government would accuse its citizens of breaching the constitution.

“Any document that can be called a constitution in the world is to restrict the operation of power, not ordinary people,” she said.

Citing the trial of former South Korean president Chun Doo-hwan, who was responsible for the country’s bloody crackdown of the Gwangju uprising in 1980, Chow said it was those who sought to concentrate power that were ruled to have breached the constitution.

‘Accomplice’

She also dismissed the prosecution’s claim that the only “reasonable and natural effect” of the Alliance’s calls was an incitement of others. Her group was merely making political criticism and had not called for action, she said.

She argued that the charge against her demonstrated the government’s “paranoia” and its attempt to silence those making unfavourable opinions, adding that the defendants wholly believed in their advocacy.

If the court found the defendants guilty, that would prohibit the political freedom that the city has long championed, she said.

“If the court cannot rigorously draw a line for what is the reasonable and natural effect [of political speech], it will easily become an accomplice in the authorities’ crime,” she said. “What is on trial is actually the law itself.”

Senior counsel Priscilia Lam, representing the Alliance, argued the prosecution had not been able to present evidence of the group’s alleged incitement to subversion.

“What did the Alliance do to incite people to subvert state power?” Lam said in Cantonese. “I have heard nothing on this after sitting here for so long.”

For decades, the Alliance organised vigils at Victoria Park to commemorate the 1989 Tiananmen crackdown in Beijing, when hundreds, perhaps thousands, were killed as troops dispersed pro-democracy demonstrators in and around Tiananmen Square.

The Alliance disbanded in 2021 after authorities banned the vigil for two years, citing Covid-19 restrictions, and arrested its leadership on national security allegations. Chow and Lee have been behind bars since September 2021.

Another defendant, former lawmaker Albert Ho, pleaded guilty when the trial opened in January.

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.

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 retired Hong Kong policeman and a former UK Border Force official were convicted by a London jury Thursday of conducting “shadow policing” on British soil on behalf of China.

Ex-police superintendent Bill Yuen, 65, and Peter Wai, 38 — both dual Chinese-British nationals — were found guilty of assisting a foreign intelligence service under Britain’s national security laws following a weeks-long trial.

Wai, who worked for the UK’s Border Force immigration and customs enforcement agency after previously serving in the British police and the Royal Navy, was also convicted of misconduct in a public office.

He had searched the interior ministry’s computer system for people of interest to Hong Kong authorities.

The jury at London’s Old Bailey court, which deliberated for nearly 24 hours, was discharged after failing to reach verdicts on a further foreign interference charge against each defendant.

Prosecutors promptly announced they would not seek a retrial and the duo were remanded into custody ahead of sentencing on a date to be set on May 15.

The court had heard how Wai had gathered intelligence on the orders of Yuen, who was a senior manager at the Hong Kong Economic Trade Office (HKETO), which represents Hong Kong’s government in London.

Politicians, campaigners

The pair targeted Hong Kong dissidents and pro-democracy protesters living in Britain, with “special attention” also paid to politicians, including senior Conservative Iain Duncan Smith.

They undertook information gathering, surveillance and acts of deception, with one operation capturing photographs of prominent campaigner Nathan Law.

Their activities coincided with Hong Kong authorities publishing bounties of around £100,000 (US$136,000) for information helping to identify several UK-based activists, including Law, jurors heard.

Another protester told the jury of how Wai had threatened him with arrest for confronting a Hong Kong diplomat in London.

Messages on Yuen’s phone showed surveillance of Law began as early as 2021, the prosecution said as it gave evidence.

See also: ‘Your inner self is red’: UK border officer accused of ‘infiltrating’ Hong Kong pro-democracy group

The defendants’ activities were exposed in May 2024 when police foiled an alleged bid to snatch a former Hong Kong resident from her flat in the northern county of Yorkshire, the court heard.

Wai, of Staines-upon-Thames, southwest of the capital — who was known to associates as Fatboy — and Yuen, of Hackney in east London, had both denied wrongdoing.

The case comes in the wake of tens of thousands of people, including democracy activists wanted by Chinese authorities, moving to Britain since Hong Kong enacted a draconian National Security Law in mid-2020.

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.

Hong Kong authorities have declined to comment on reports that an activist wanted by the city’s national security police could face deportation to China after being arrested in Thailand for allegedly overstaying her visa.

Responding to media queries about concerns that wanted activist Zhang Xinyan could be transferred to China, the Security Bureau said on Monday that it would not comment on news reports about law enforcement actions in other jurisdictions.

“Endangering national security is an extremely serious crime… no fugitive should harbour the illusion that they can evade criminal liability by fleeing Hong Kong,” the bureau said in a statement.

Zhang, 54, is wanted by national security police for allegedly committing subversion, a crime under Article 23 – also known as Hong Kong’s homegrown national security law.

NGO Human Rights Watch (HRW) said on Saturday that Zhang could face deportation from Thailand. She is now being held at the Suan Phlu Immigration Detention Centre in Bangkok.

Zhang holds refugee status issued by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the NGO said.

According to media reports, overseas activist group the Hong Kong Parliament said she had overstayed her visa in Thailand.

Hong Kong and Thailand do not have any extradition agreements, although the transfer of fugitives can still be arranged. In February, a 62-year-old man accused in a murder case nearly 37 years ago was arrested in Thailand and extradited to Hong Kong.

HRW senior Thailand adviser Sunai Phasuk said sending Zhang to Hong Kong would put her in “grave danger.”

“Thai authorities should do the right thing by immediately releasing her and ensuring that she is not put in harm’s way,” he said.

34 activists wanted

Zhang is among a group of 19 activists named in a round of arrest warrants issued in July 2025, with bounties between HK$200,000 and HK$1 million.

Authorities cited their involvement from February to June 2025 in the “Hong Kong Parliament,” a group of overseas activists who held unofficial polls outside the city to form a shadow legislature to “pursue the ideal of Hong Kong people ruling Hong Kong.”

According to the Hong Kong Parliament’s YouTube channel, Zhang ran for a seat in the shadow legislature earlier that year.

According to the police force’s notices, Zhang and the others wanted for their involvement in the Hong Kong Parliament have a view to achieve self-determination and subvert state power.

In total, 34 people are wanted under the national security law on suspicion of committing offences including subversion, inciting secession and colluding with foreign forces.

Some of them have bounties of HK$1 million on their heads, including former pro-democracy lawmakers Ted Hui, Dennis Kwok and Nathan Law.

Activists Anna Kwok and Frances Hui, as well as political commentator Elmer Yuen, who is accused of launching a “referendum” to form the Hong Kong Parliament, are also among those targeted with million-dollar bounties.