Defending Beijing’s draconian crackdown on political freedoms in Hong Kong, following the extraordinary protest movement in 2019, the territory’s former leader, Carrie Lam, would claim that there was no “one-size-fits-all” approach to doing democracy. Such rhetoric was, of course, only ever disingenuous sophistry. The conclusion of Hong Kong’s largest-ever national security trial on Tuesday confirmed the grisly trajectory of recent years under Ms Lam’s successor, John Lee: a consolidation of nakedly authoritarian rule has led to the suppression of a once vibrant and politically diverse civil society.
In all, 45 pro-democracy activists were jailed under Hong Kong’s punitive national security law (NSL), imposed by Beijing in 2020. Charged the same year with conspiracy to commit subversion against the state, their “crime” had been, in fact, to pursue a peaceful route to goals including democratic elections for the city’s leader and police accountability.
