Hong Kong Court Sentences Joshua Wong to 10 Years on National Security Charge

Hong Kong's High Court on Thursday sentenced activist Joshua Wong to 10 years in prison on a national security charge of collusion with foreign entities. Wong, 30, had pleaded guilty to conspiring to collude with foreign forces under the National Security Law.

Judge William Tam set a starting point of 13 years and reduced the term to 10 years for the early guilty plea. Two months and two days of the new sentence will run at the same time as the term Wong is already serving. The case was listed as HCCC 181/2026. Judge Tam said the punishment must fit the gravity of the crime, and he called the case grave.

What the court said he did

Prosecutors accused Wong of conspiring with self-exiled activist Nathan Law and others in 2020 to ask foreign countries, institutions, organisations or individuals outside China to impose sanctions or blockades, or to take other hostile action against the governments of Hong Kong and China. The offences ran from July 1 to November 23, 2020. Judge Tam said that period was a time when Hong Kong faced a high risk to its rule of law.

The National Security Law sets terms of 3 to 10 years for foreign collusion, and 10 years to life for offences judged to be of a grave nature. Wong pleaded guilty in September. Human Rights Watch gave the plea date as September 2.

A sentence on top of a sentence

Wong was already serving 4 years and 8 months in prison after pleading guilty in a subversion trial in 2024. He had been due for release in January. Human Rights Watch said the new term means he faces imprisonment until late 2036, when he will be 40.

He has been in detention since November 2020, when he pleaded guilty to inciting and organising an unauthorised assembly during the 2019 protests. He was arrested again in June last year inside Stanley Prison over the new national security allegation, while he was serving the primary election case sentence.

That earlier case was the largest prosecution of pro-democracy activists under the National Security Law. Most of the 47 defendants pleaded guilty. Fourteen were convicted after a trial in 2024 and sentenced to up to 10 years in prison.

Security outside the court

Police raised security outside the court on Thursday morning. Dozens of people had camped out, some for two nights, ahead of the sentencing.

Wong became a prominent activist as a teenager and first entered prison at 23. Reuters described him as the global face of Hong Kong's pro-democracy movement. He turned 30 last month.

Human Rights Watch described the charges as baseless. That characterisation is the organisation's view, reported here as its position.