Hong Kong 47: 45 activists jailed for 4 to 10 years over plot to overthrow government

Forty-five Hong Kong opposition figures were jailed on Tuesday for four to 10 years for their participation in a plot to overthrow the government in 2020, with former legal scholar Benny Tai Yiu-ting receiving the stiffest sentence for masterminding an unauthorised legislative “primary” election to subvert state power.

The sentencing brought to a close the city’s largest and longest-running national security trial that had initially involved a group of 47 accused of plotting to ride on the momentum of the 2019 anti-government protests to win control of the Legislative Council and destroy the government.

More than two-thirds of the 45 convicted defendants had been on remand since March 2021, effectively reducing the remaining length of their prison term.

Four former lawmakers, including Claudia Mo Man-ching, 67, received the shortest jail term of four years and two months and are expected to complete their sentences as early as April next year.

But Tai, 60, may need to spend another eight years behind bars. The former University of Hong Kong associate professor, also a co-founder of the 2014 Occupy protests, was previously jailed in two cases for a total of 26 months for incitement during the campaign and illegally incurring election expenses in 2016. He had served four months from previous proceedings before he was remanded for the subversion charge.

Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu lauded the ruling as a fair reflection of the “very serious” nature of the case, holding “anti-China forces” to account for destabilising Hong Kong under the pretext of pursuing democracy, freedom and human rights.