Following the ruling, Margaret Ng, a lawyer and fund trustee who was convicted with Zen, highlighted that this was the first time that anyone had been convicted under Hong Kong’s Societies Ordinance for failing to register a society and said that the case is important for “freedom of association in Hong Kong.”
Along with Zen and Ng, singer-activist Denise Ho, cultural studies scholar Hui Po-Keung, and ex-legislator Cyd Ho have also appealed the conviction.
Sze Ching-wee, the former secretary of the 612 Humanitarian Relief Fund, has not filed for an appeal. Sze was arrested earlier in November under Hong Kong’s national security law. He has been released on bail and is required to report to the police in February.
Days before Zen filed for an appeal, a Hong Kong court sentenced Jimmy Lai, a Catholic pro-democracy advocate and former publisher of Hong Kong’s Apple Daily to an additional five years and nine months in jail for breaching the lease on one of his newspaper’s offices, according to AFP.
Lai, who has been jailed since December 2020 for his involvement in pro-democracy protests, also faces the possibility of being sentenced to life in prison under national security charges.
On Dec. 13, a Hong Kong court delayed Lai’s national security trial, initially scheduled for this month, until September 2023.
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