Monday, defense attorneys for Cardinal Joseph Zen and five other Hong Kong democracy campaigners took the stand in the same courthouse where last week a Protestant pastor was sentenced to one year in prison for sedition.
On October 31, at Zen’s third court appearance this month, his defense argued before Chief Magistrate Ada Yim Shun-yee that the charges against the trustees of the 612 Humanitarian Relief Fund should be dropped.
The 90-year-old cardinal and the other trustees have been charged for failing to register the 612 Humanitarian Relief Fund as a local charity between 2019 and 2021. The fund assisted pro-democracy demonstrators with their legal bills until its dissolution in October 2021.
Within one month of its formation, the Societies Ordinance of Hong Kong required any club, corporation, partnership, or organization of persons to register with the police commissioner or request an exemption.
Asia News said that, according to the defense, the trustees lacked reciprocal rights and responsibilities and consequently did not establish a society as specified by the code.
According to the South China Morning Post, the prosecution claimed last week that the fund needed to be registered with the authorities due to its “huge” size and “systematic” style of operation. For breaking the ordinance, Zen and the other democracy activists might face a $1,200 (HK$10,000) punishment.
The retired bishop of Hong Kong was arrested alongside other democratic advocates in May under Hong Kong’s draconian national security statute, but he now faces a lesser charge. He has been out on bond since the beginning of May.
The West Kowloon court convicted a Protestant pastor of sedition last week for criticizing a judge for losing her “conscience” and clapping at a hearing earlier this year about a vigil remembering the 1989 Tiananmen Square tragedy.
On October 27, Reverend Garry Pang Moon-yuen was sentenced to one year in prison. The 59-year-old pastor stated, “I may have lost the case on paper, but I am a winner in terms of defending conscience and justice and protecting the rule of law.”