Hong Kong national security police charge man over wearing alleged ‘seditious’ shirt at airport
Hong Kong Free Press
A 26-year-old man has been charged by national security police over allegedly wearing “seditious” clothes at Hong Kong’s international airport.
According to a government statement issued on Wednesday, the man was arrested at the airport on Monday. He was charged on Wednesday with “doing an act or acts with seditious intention” and “possessing seditious publications” under the colonial-era sedition law, and with having another person’s identity card.
The case will be mentioned on Wednesday afternoon at West Kowloon Magistrates’ Courts. Those convicted under the sedition law face up to two years in prison.
The government said that the police received reports on Monday afternoon that a man at the airport was wearing a shirt with “seditious wording.”
“Police officers sped to the scene and further seized some flags and clothing with seditious wording, as well as an identity card relating to another person from his personal belongings, ” the statement read.
Sedition is not covered by the Beijing-imposed national security law, which targets secession, subversion, collusion with foreign forces and terrorist acts and mandates up to life imprisonment. Those convicted under the sedition law – last amended in the 1970s when Hong Kong was still a British colony – face a maximum penalty of two years in prison.
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