Four former student leaders from the University of Hong Kong were yesterday sentenced to two years in prison for inciting people to wound others through their praise of a man who stabbed a police officer before killing himself in 2021.
Kinson Cheung (張敬生), Charles Kwok (郭永皓), Chris Todorovski (杜林丞亨) and Anthony Yung (容頌禧) are being held responsible for their roles in passing a motion in the students union council.
The motion expressed “deep sadness” and appreciated the “sacrifice” of the man who took his own life.
Photo: AP
The resolution came against the backdrop of widespread public anger against the police, who were condemned as being heavy-handed in quelling the 2019 pro-democracy protests.
Handing down the sentences, Judge Adriana Noelle Tse Ching (謝沈智慧) said the words they used were likely to incite hatred against the police.
The charge the four were facing was a serious offense and a lenient sentence would send “the wrong message” to society, she said.
Leung Kin-fai (梁健輝) stabbed a police officer with a knife before turning the weapon on himself on July 1, 2021. He was described by Hong Kong authorities as a “lone wolf” domestic terrorist who was politically radicalized.
The passing of the motion drew criticism from the university and Hong Kong’s Security Bureau, prompting Kwok and his peers to apologize and retract the resolution. Some student leaders also stepped down from their posts.
However, their apology did not end the political storm, and police arrested the four in August 2021.
They were originally charged with advocating terrorism under a national security law imposed by Beijing following the 2019 protests, but that charge was dropped after they pleaded guilty to an alternative charge of incitement to wound with intent last month.
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un sent Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) greetings with what appeared to be restrained rhetoric that comes as Pyongyang moves closer to Russia and depends less on its long-time Asian ally. Kim wished “the Chinese people greater success in building a modern socialist country,” in a reply message to Xi for his congratulations on North Korea’s birthday, the state-run Korean Central News Agency reported yesterday. The 190-word dispatch had little of the florid language that had been a staple of their correspondence, which has declined significantly this year, an analysis by Seoul-based specialist service NK Pro showed. It said
On an island of windswept tundra in the Bering Sea, hundreds of miles from mainland Alaska, a resident sitting outside their home saw — well, did they see it? They were pretty sure they saw it — a rat. The purported sighting would not have gotten attention in many places around the world, but it caused a stir on Saint Paul Island, which is part of the Pribilof Islands, a birding haven sometimes called the “Galapagos of the north” for its diversity of life. That is because rats that stow away on vessels can quickly populate and overrun remote islands, devastating bird
‘CLOSER TO THE END’: The Ukrainian leader said in an interview that only from a ‘strong position’ can Ukraine push Russian President Vladimir Putin ‘to stop the war’ Decisive actions by the US now could hasten the end of the Russian war against Ukraine next year, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Monday after telling ABC News that his nation was “closer to the end of the war.” “Now, at the end of the year, we have a real opportunity to strengthen cooperation between Ukraine and the United States,” Zelenskiy said in a post on Telegram after meeting with a bipartisan delegation from the US Congress. “Decisive action now could hasten the just end of Russian aggression against Ukraine next year,” he wrote. Zelenskiy is in the US for the UN
A 64-year-old US woman took her own life inside a controversial suicide capsule at a Swiss woodland retreat, with Swiss police on Tuesday saying several people had been arrested. The space-age looking Sarco capsule, which fills with nitrogen and causes death by hypoxia, was used on Monday outside a village near the German border. The portable human-sized pod, self-operated by a button inside, has raised a host of legal and ethical questions in Switzerland. Active euthanasia is banned in the country, but assisted dying has been legal for decades. On the same day it was used, Swiss Department of Home