Three Hong Kong activists who organised annual vigils commemorating Beijing’s 1989 crackdown on Tiananmen Square protests have been handed prison sentences of up to seven years. Two of the defendants – Lee Cheuk-yan, 69, and Chow Hang-tung, 41 – were convicted last month of inciting others to subvert state power, under the city’s controversial national
Tung Chee-hwa, Hong Kong’s first leader after the city returned to Chinese rule, has died at the age of 89. The former shipping scion took over the reins from the last British Governor Chris Patten in July 1997 when the UK handed Hong Kong back to China, ending more than 150 years of British control.
Lee and Chow were also leaders of the now-defunct Hong Kong Alliance (HKA). The HKA was founded in May 1989 to support students holding pro-democracy rallies. Weeks later, the Communist Party crushed pro-democracy protests in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square with troops and tanks. Estimates of the death toll range from a few hundred to many thousands.
