The books likened democracy activists to sheep pursued by wolves
A Hong Kong court has convicted five former speech therapists of sedition for publishing children’s books likening democracy activists to sheep pursued by wolves, continuing a crackdown on free speech in the territory.
The former members of the General Union of Hong Kong Speech Therapists were found guilty of conspiring to publish, distribute, display or reproduce seditious publications by Judge Wai-kin Kwok at the District Court on Wednesday.
They face as many as two years in prison, the maximum sentence for the colonial-era offense. All five pleaded not guilty and will appeal the verdict.
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The two men and three women in their 20s were arrested in July last year for publishing three books with the intention of inciting “hatred or contempt” against the Hong Kong government and justice administration. They were detained before their union’s Saturday reading session for children, and held for more than a year without bail.
In its campaign against dissent, Hong Kong has jailed scores of journalists, politicians and civil society figures – and pressured lawyers defending them – in the wake of 2019’s anti-government unrest. That drive has undermined the city’s status as a liberal finance hub and prompted concerns its rule of law is deteriorating.
Some 60 people have been arrested for sedition under the 1938 Crimes Ordinance since September 2020. Before that, sedition had for decades been considered overridden by the city’s legal guarantees of free speech.
A landmark court ruling last December, however, expanded the scope of a Beijing-drafted national security law imposed in June 2020 to also cover sedition. That meant the British-era offense was no longer bound by free speech legislation.
In March, the first guilty verdict for sedition was handed down to a former radio host, who was sentenced to 40 months in prison. He is also appealing the verdict.
One book published by the speech therapists’ union, Twelve Warriors of the Sheep Village, showed cartoon animals fleeing a group of wolves before being captured at sea and sent to prison.
The scenario mirrors the case of Hong Kong activists caught by the Chinese coast guard while attempting to flee to Taiwan. One page of the book features the real names of the dozen activists against sheep profile pictures.
In another book, medical-worker unionists who went on a high-profile strike early in the pandemic to pressure the government to shut the border with mainland China are shown as a sheep.
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