cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/53426860

Hong Kong and Macau were once the only places in China where people could publicly mourn Beijing's deadly crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators in Tiananmen Square on June 4, 1989.

Defendants Lee Cheuk-yan, 69, and Chow Hang-tung, 41, were leaders of a now-defunct group called the Hong Kong Alliance that arranged an annual candlelight vigil in the city's Victoria Park for decades.

However, Beijing imposed a national security law on the former British colony in 2020 after huge and sometimes violent pro-democracy protests the year before.

Lee and Chow were arrested in 2021 and are standing trial for "incitement to subversion", which carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in jail.

[...]

Erik Shum, a defence lawyer representing Lee, told the court that the Alliance's "end one-party rule" slogan did not mean it intended to overthrow Communist Party leadership.

"It does not target the Communist Party, no matter which party is in power... it should not be a dictatorship," Shum said.

He told the three-judge panel that the court must not pay "lip service" to human rights, adding that the right to criticise state organs is protected by China's constitution.

[...]

The Alliance was founded in May 1989 to support the democratic movement led by students and workers in Beijing.

Its key tenets included "building a democratic China" and "ending one-party rule".

[...]