A Hong Kong judge has rejected an attempt by former editors of online media outlet Stand News to terminate their sedition trial, ruling that a fair hearing was still possible even though prosecutors failed to hand over to the defence all of the material they had gathered.
Chung Pui-kuen and Patrick Lam – accused of conspiring to distribute 17 seditious articles – had sought a permanent halt to the hearing because of the prosecution’s late disclosure of more than 500 articles it had archived.
Judge Kwok Wai-kin said he would give detailed reasons for his decision at the end of the trial.
Screenshots of personal Facebook
As the trial resumed on Thursday, the prosecution summoned a national security police officer to testify about screenshots of the Facebook personal profile of Yeung Tin-shui, former chief editor of Stand News’ UK bureau.
But the defence complained that these screenshots were only submitted by the prosecution on December 8 this year, after the trial began. “This is completely unacceptable,” defence counsel Audrey Eu told the court.
Prosecutor Jennifer Tsui said the screenshots – showing what Yeung liked and posted on Facebook – could illustrate the operational practices of the Stand News UK bureau.
Kwok ruled that the screenshots were admissible.
The Stand News sedition trial – which began on October 31 and was scheduled to last for 20 days – was temporarily halted after it was revealed during witness testimony that the police had archived hundreds more articles than those provided by the prosecution to the defence as potential evidence. Consequently, the defence applied for a permanent stay of proceedings.
The anti-sedition legislation, which was last amended in the 1970s when Hong Kong was still under British colonial rule, is part of the Crimes Ordinance and separate from the Beijing-imposed national security law. It outlaws incitement to violence or disaffection against the authorities, along with other offences, and is punishable by up to two years’ imprisonment.
Stand News, a non-profit news outlet, shut down in December 2021 after its newsroom was raided by more than 200 national security police officers. Seven people connected to the publication – including Chung and Lam – were arrested on suspicion of conspiring to publish seditious articles.
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