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250 People Arrested Under National Security Law Since 2020: Hong Kong Justice Chief

City's justice chief Paul Lam Ting-kwok claims "only a very small number" were affected by the draconian National Security Law
Leo Timm
Leo Timm covers China-related news, culture, and history. Follow him on Twitter at @kunlunpeaks
Published: April 3, 2023
Police stand watch as a group of residents hold the first authorised protest and march in several years in Hong Kong against the proposal for reclamation in the district on Tseung Kwan O on March 26, 2023. (Image: PETER PARKS/AFP via Getty Images)

Two hundred and fifty people in Hong Kong have been arrested on charges of breaking the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)-imposed National Security Law and 20-30 of them were convicted, according to the city’s Secretary for Justice Paul Lam Ting-kwok.

Speaking on radio on Sunday (April 2), Lam used the number to say that “only a very small number of people had actually been affected” by the controversial NSL since its implementation in Hong Kong starting June 30, 2020.

The National Security Law bans any act considered by the authorities to endanger China’s national interests, including criticizing the policies of the CCP regime or advocating the independence of Hong Kong.

Thousands of Hongkongers have been detained during and following the 2019 pro-democracy movement, in which millions of the city’s residents marched to protest the Communist Party’s destruction of their civil liberties legally guaranteed by the “one country, two systems” arrangement.

Breaking the NSL can be punished with up to life in prison.