Seven Hong Kongers who tried to flee to Taiwan by speedboat to escape protest-related charges were yesterday sentenced to between seven and 10 months imprisonment for acts to “pervert the course of justice.”
The seven men were among 12 people involved in the territory’s democracy movement who were in August 2020 caught by the Chinese coast guard on a speedboat bound for Taiwan.
After serving time in a prison in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen, all except two have returned to Hong Kong.
Photo: REUTERS
Six of them were sentenced to 10 months, while 32-year-old Li Tsz-yin (李子賢) was sentenced to seven months. Li is currently serving a three-year-and-six-month jail term for rioting and assaulting a police officer.
Defense lawyers had argued that the men had already served time in a mainland Chinese jail, but Deputy District Judge Newman Wong (王興偉) said the men had “given the public a sense of contempt for the judiciary and a deliberate challenge to the legal system.”
The sentencing came just days after another group of young men, including one shot by a police officer in 2019, were caught during a purported attempt to flee Hong Kong by boat.
Steve Li (李桂華), senior superintendent at the Hong Kong Police Force’s national security department, told reporters that the group of four men, aged 16 to 24, had been arrested in the countryside at dawn on Wednesday.
They had all faced rioting and illegal assembly charges, but had failed to show up in court, leading to warrants being issued for their arrests.
Since late 2020 and early last year, the four men had holed up in various places including a windowless room in an industrial building, supported by a group of handlers, some of whom had since fled to the UK, Steve Li said.
“Because they knew the police were investigating their whereabouts, they kept changing their hiding place,” Steve Li told reporters. “They were placed in cardboard boxes and moved about, like cargo, to new hideouts.”
Local media said the group had been en route to a speedboat at a remote pier that was bound for Taiwan, and had been caught with New Taiwan dollars and multiple phone cards among other items.
“We saw that all four of the men had long, unkempt hair, their bodies were very thin and they looked anguished and downcast,” Steve Li said.
One of the suspects, 21-year-old Tsang Chi-kin (曾志健), was brought into court on Thursday with chains around the wrists and waist, sporting shoulder-length hair and dressed in black shorts.
Tsang, a former high-school student, was shot in the chest by police on Oct. 1, 2019, only to be charged with rioting. He later sought asylum in the US consulate, but was rejected.
CRITICAL MOVE: TSMC’s plan to invest another US$100 billion in US chipmaking would boost Taiwan’s competitive edge in the global market, the premier said The government would ensure that the most advanced chipmaking technology stays in Taiwan while assisting Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) in investing overseas, the Presidential Office said yesterday. The statement follows a joint announcement by the world’s largest contract chipmaker and US President Donald Trump on Monday that TSMC would invest an additional US$100 billion over the next four years to expand its semiconductor manufacturing operations in the US, which would include construction of three new chip fabrication plants, two advanced packaging facilities, and a research and development center. The government knew about the deal in advance and would assist, Presidential
‘DANGEROUS GAME’: Legislative Yuan budget cuts have already become a point of discussion for Democrats and Republicans in Washington, Elbridge Colby said Taiwan’s fall to China “would be a disaster for American interests” and Taipei must raise defense spending to deter Beijing, US President Donald Trump’s pick to lead Pentagon policy, Elbridge Colby, said on Tuesday during his US Senate confirmation hearing. The nominee for US undersecretary of defense for policy told the Armed Services Committee that Washington needs to motivate Taiwan to avoid a conflict with China and that he is “profoundly disturbed” about its perceived reluctance to raise defense spending closer to 10 percent of GDP. Colby, a China hawk who also served in the Pentagon in Trump’s first team,
SEPARATE: The MAC rebutted Beijing’s claim that Taiwan is China’s province, asserting that UN Resolution 2758 neither mentions Taiwan nor grants the PRC authority over it The “status quo” of democratic Taiwan and autocratic China not belonging to each other has long been recognized by the international community, the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said yesterday in its rebuttal of Beijing’s claim that Taiwan can only be represented in the UN as “Taiwan, Province of China.” Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) yesterday at a news conference of the third session at the 14th National People’s Congress said that Taiwan can only be referred to as “Taiwan, Province of China” at the UN. Taiwan is an inseparable part of Chinese territory, which is not only history but
INVESTMENT WATCH: The US activity would not affect the firm’s investment in Taiwan, where 11 production lines would likely be completed this year, C.C. Wei said Investments by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) in the US should not be a cause for concern, but rather seen as the moment that the company and Taiwan stepped into the global spotlight, President William Lai (賴清德) told a news conference at the Presidential Office in Taipei yesterday alongside TSMC chairman and chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家). Wei and US President Donald Trump in Washington on Monday announced plans to invest US$100 billion in the US to build three advanced foundries, two packaging plants, and a research and development center, after Trump threatened to slap tariffs on chips made