Joshua Wong gets 10 more years under Hong Kong security law

A Hong Kong court sentenced pro-democracy activist Joshua Wong, 30, to 10 more years in prison on Thursday, Nov. 5, 2026, for conspiracy to collude with foreign forces under the national security law Beijing imposed on the city in 2020.

The new term comes on top of the four years and eight months Wong is already serving in the “Hong Kong 47” case, and he had been due to be freed in January 2027. Hong Kong Free Press, as cited by Taiwan’s Central News Agency, said he is now expected to remain in prison until 2036 unless the sentence is reduced.

High Court Judge William Tam said he started from a 13-year term and cut it for Wong’s guilty plea and other mitigating factors, The Associated Press reported. The AP also reported that Tam ruled the remaining two months of the earlier sentence will run at the same time as the new one.

“The punishment must fit the gravity of the crime committed,” Tam wrote, according to the AP. He said it was “necessary for this court to express the community’s abhorrence of the defendant’s scheme and acts together with others to collude with foreign forces.”

The prosecution said Wong and fellow activist Nathan Law agreed around 2016 to lobby internationally for democratic self-determination. After the security law took effect, the AP reported, Law and others met foreign politicians and ran petition drives, while Wong supported the effort from Hong Kong through foreign media and social media to bolster calls for sanctions, a blockade or other hostile measures. Law left for the United Kingdom and is wanted by Hong Kong authorities.

Tam pointed to the U.S. revocation of Hong Kong’s special trading status and to American sanctions on Chinese and Hong Kong officials as the kinds of measures Wong and Law had called for, the AP reported.

Wong’s lawyer, Derek Chan, asked the court for a sentence that would leave Wong some hope, the AP reported. In a statement written in prison, Wong said he believed he was acting within the law and had not directly advocated sanctions when he reposted others’ messages, but later realized his judgment was wrong, according to the AP.

Hong Kong leader John Lee said Wong, Law and their accomplices were among the “primary culprits responsible for undermining Hong Kong’s prosperity and stability.” Steve Li, chief superintendent of the police national security department, welcomed the ruling, the AP reported.

The U.S. Consulate in Hong Kong said Wong had been “unjustly imprisoned” since late 2020 and called for his immediate release. Britain’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office said the case was a clear example of the security law being used against people for political expression and participation, the AP reported.

Taiwan’s Presidential Office spokesperson Karen Kuo said “Seeking democracy should not be a crime,” Focus Taiwan reported. China’s foreign ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun said Wong pleaded guilty in the face of overwhelming facts and evidence, and that Beijing supports Hong Kong in upholding national security, according to the AP.

Eric Lai of the Georgetown Center for Asian Law told the AP that most of the alleged conduct was online speech and the sharing of public information, which would not be seen as a major threat to national security in liberal democracies.

No statement from the Canadian government appeared in the AP and Focus Taiwan reports reviewed for this story. Canada is home to a Hong Kong diaspora community, and Canada News Media has previously covered the effect of the national security law on Hong Kong and how that diaspora has helped new arrivals.

Neither report said whether Wong will appeal. Wong was first taken into custody in November 2020 over an unauthorized assembly outside police headquarters during the 2019 protests, Focus Taiwan reported. The AP report was also carried by CTV News.

Via The Associated Press and Focus Taiwan (Central News Agency).

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