11th September 2026 – (Hong Kong) Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu said today’s jail terms for former Hong Kong Alliance leaders show the court judged their offences extremely serious and that nobody may steal the language of democracy and freedom to harm the country and compatriots.
The High Court, sitting at West Kowloon, sentenced Chow Hang-tung to seven years and three months, Lee Cheuk-yan to seven years and Albert Ho Chun-yan to five years and two months for inciting others to subvert state power, and fined the dissolved Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China HK$1.5 million. Ho had pleaded guilty before trial; Lee, Chow and the Alliance were convicted after contesting the charge.
Mr Lee said the earlier conviction judgment made plain that the Alliance’s programme aimed to overthrow and undermine the Communist Party of China’s leadership under the national Constitution. Through hostility and division, he said, the defendants sought to destroy public trust in the Party and thereby attack the fundamental system of the People’s Republic of China. Even after the Hong Kong National Security Law took effect, they “refused to pull back from the brink” and persisted in trying to use the Alliance to subvert state power. Anyone who incites such subversion and endangers national security will be punished according to law without indulgence, he added. Quoting the court’s finding that their conduct went beyond lawful free expression into inciting others to use unlawful means to overthrow state power, he said today’s sentences prove the gravity and the need for stern punishment to uphold the rule of law. “The law never allows anyone to cloak harm to their country and compatriots in human rights, democracy and freedom,” he declared.
An HKSAR Government spokesman said the Constitution and the Basic Law together set Hong Kong’s constitutional order, and that core constitutional elements — including sovereignty, unity and territorial integrity — apply to the Special Administrative Region. Party leadership, the spokesman argued, is the core of the fundamental system established by the Constitution; Article 1 forbids any organisation or individual from sabotaging the socialist system. Article 22 of the National Security Law bars organising, planning, committing or participating in acts that, by force, threat of force or other unlawful means, overthrow or undermine that fundamental system or the Central People’s Government. Overturning or wrecking the Party’s leadership under the Constitution, the spokesman said, equates to the fundamental-system offences described in Article 22.
The spokesman also accused recent Western countries, anti-China groups, politicians and overseas media of malicious attacks and smears over this and other cases. Defendants were not tried for political views or beliefs, the government insisted, but solely on the law and evidence, to the criminal standard of proof beyond reasonable doubt, with fair-trial protections under the Basic Law and the Hong Kong Bill of Rights and without interference. The administration, it stressed, will keep enforcing national-security laws strictly: where there is a law it will be followed, enforced and applied.
Inside court, retired Cardinal Joseph Zen Ze-kiun, Lee Cheuk-yan’s wife and former Alliance standing-committee members watched from the public gallery. Lee and Chow took the sentences calmly, then briefly smiled; Lee made the sign of the cross toward the gallery before entering custody, while Chow blew a kiss. Lee and Chow have already spent more than 1,400 days in detention and are expected to remain inside until about September 2029 and January 2030 respectively; Ho, remanded for about 1,300 days after earlier bail, could be released as early as April 2028 on the five-year, two-month term.