Hong Kong's High Court on Tuesday quashed a court reporting restriction for a landmark national security case involving a now disbanded group that once organised the city's annual candlelight vigils to commemorate the 1989 Tiananmen crackdown.
The decision by Court of First Instance judge Alex Lee removes a ban on reporting imposed by a lower court magistrate and will allow open reporting of pre-trial proceedings - known as committal hearings - in a Hong Kong national security case for the first time.
"The magistrate's reasoning was totally in opposition to the principles of Open Justice that govern the exercise of judicial power in the context of restricting access to, or reporting of, court proceedings," Lee wrote in a summary of the judgment, adding that the magistrate, Peter Law, had "erred" in his decision.
