Hong Kong Free Press reports
Hong Kong activist Tong Ying-kit, the first person jailed under the Beijing-imposed national security law, is set to challenge his conviction and sentence next March.
The Court of Appeal on Friday set a date for the 24-year-old to seek a reversal of the High Court’s decision in July, when three judges who had been specially selected to hear national security cases handed him a nine-year prison term for inciting secession and engaging in terrorist acts.
The activist was arrested on July 1 last year, just hours after the security law came into force, when he drove a motorcycle with a flag reading “Liberate Hong Kong, revolution of our times” into three police officers during a demonstration in Wan Chai.
The protest slogan was said to be capable of inciting others to commit secession, while Tong’s act of ramming his vehicle into police “seriously jeopardised public safety or security,” the court ruled.
Tong’s 15-day trial saw the prosecution and defence call three academics to debate the meaning of the protest slogan, which was banned by the government a day after Tong’s arrest for carrying connotations of “pro-independence, secession and subversion.” The defence argued that its meaning was ambiguous.
