First conviction under Hong Kong’s new security law for wearing ‘seditious’ T-shirt

Chu Kai-pong was arrested in June last year for wearing a T-shirt with a protest slogan

A Hong Kong man has pleaded guilty to sedition for wearing a T-shirt with a protest slogan on it, becoming the first person to be convicted under the city’s new security legislation.

Chu Kai-pong, 27, was arrested in June last year for wearing a T-shirt with a protest slogan “Liberate Hong Kong, revolution of our times”, which the city’s authorities consider secessionist.

He pleaded guilty to a charge of “doing acts with seditious intent”.

After Mr Chu’s arrest, police said that the slogan on his clothing could incite hatred, contempt, or disaffection against the “fundamental system of the state established by the constitution of the People’s Republic of China”.

Mr Chu admitted to wearing the T-shirt to commemorate the 2019 street protests and said he wanted to remind people of the demonstrations.

He is the first person convicted under the Safeguarding National Security Ordinance in Hong Kong – also known as Article 23 – which was passed in March.

The new security law increased the maximum sentence for the offence of sedition from two to seven years and even 10 years in case of “collusion with foreign forces”.

Mr Chu said he purchased the protest slogan T-shirt from a company in Taiwan. At the time of his arrest, he was also wearing a yellow mask with the letters “FDNOL”, an acronym for the protest slogan “five demands, not one less”, representing the movement’s key demands.

In court on Monday, it was revealed that Mr Chu had told police that “FDNOL” carried a meaning similar to the “Liberate Hong Kong” slogan.

Both slogans were commonly chanted during the protests of 2019.

In Hong Kong’s first trial under a separate national security law enacted in 2020, the court determined that the phrase “Liberate Hong Kong, revolution of our times” carried secessionist connotations.

Mr Chu’s lawyer, Steven Kwan, clarified in court that the protest slogan related to the movement’s demands had not been declared illegal and carried a different meaning.

Mr Kwan also argued that there was no evidence showing anyone had been “incited” by the slogan during the 25 minutes Mr Chu wore the T-shirt, and noted that Mr Chu had not used the internet to commit the offence.

The lawyer acknowledged that a prison sentence was inevitable but requested a one-third reduction due to Mr Chu’s guilty plea.

The new Safeguarding National Security Ordinance, separate from the 2020 national security law, targets sedition and other offences.

The 2020 law introduced life imprisonment as the maximum penalty for crimes like secession, subversion, terrorism, or collusion with foreign forces.

Chief Magistrate Victor So, specifically appointed by city leader John Lee to handle national security cases, postponed Mr Chu’s case until Thursday for sentencing.