2 Hong Kong Tiananmen vigil leaders convicted in security case
Why it matters: The ruling deepens a crackdown that has erased one of Chinese territory's last public Tiananmen memorials.
Two former organizers of Hong Kong's annual Tiananmen Square vigil were convicted Friday of inciting subversion under the city's national security law, a ruling that could send them to prison for up to 10 years. Lee Cheuk-yan, 69, and Chow Hang-tung, 41, were found guilty along with the now-defunct Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China. Judges said the group's call to “end one-party dictatorship” amounted to urging the overthrow of China's Communist Party leadership. The case centers on a law Beijing imposed in 2020, the same year authorities stopped the candlelight vigil, once the only large-scale public commemoration of the 1989 Tiananmen crackdown on Chinese soil.