Ms. Wong Ji-yuet, Sentenced to 4 Years and 5 Months in the Hong Kong 47 Case, Spends Her 29th Birthday in Prison

(Reported by the Rights Defense Network Information Center) On September 27, 2026, this website learned that today Ms. Wong Ji-yuet, who was sentenced to 4 years and 5 months in the Hong Kong 47 case, spent her 29th birthday in prison. For participating in the 2020 pro-democracy primaries, she was sentenced to 4 years and 5 months in the Hong Kong 47 case for “conspiracy to subvert state power” and is still serving her sentence.

Wong Ji-yuet: Female, born September 27, 1997, English name Prince Wong Ji-yuet, a national of the People's Republic of China (Hong Kong), former spokesperson for Scholarism, founder of the Education Experiment Society, pro-democracy New Territories West primary-election candidate, localist democrat, and political prisoner held in China.

She grew up in Hong Kong and came of age alongside Hong Kong after the transfer of sovereignty from Britain to China; as a young child, she first learned about China's politics after hearing from her parents about the 1989 “June 4” events; in secondary school, she began participating in some social movements and attended the “June 4” commemoration and the “July 1” march for the first time; later, as the “anti-national education” movement (that is, the movement against national education and for depoliticization) emerged in Hong Kong, she joined the group opposing Putonghua-medium instruction in Chinese language classes, and later joined Scholarism (abbreviated as “Scholarism”); during the 2014 Umbrella Movement, although she was still a secondary school student, she actively participated in the Occupy Central campaign and went on hunger strike to protest the injustice of the regime; in 2015, she entered Lingnan University in Hong Kong to study visual studies and art, and in May of that year began serving as a Scholarism spokesperson; after Scholarism disbanded, however, she became more introspective and reflective, and more mature, and therefore founded the Education Experiment Society, which mainly took part in civic education activities; from 2017 to 2018, she applied for a one-year leave of absence for mental health reasons; in 2019, she took part in the “anti-extradition” movement, but did not join any organization, choosing instead to take to the streets in protest, like other Hong Kong people, in her personal capacity; on November 18 of that year, large numbers of citizens streamed onto several streets in Yau Tsim Mong District to rescue students besieged by Hong Kong police at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University (abbreviated as “PolyU”), and amid fierce clashes with police, a stampede occurred in Yau Ma Tei; in the chaos, police arrested more than 1,000 citizens, and she was among those arrested; she was subsequently accused of rioting, but was granted bail pending trial after a short period in custody.

On May 10, 2020, after internet users called on citizens to hold “Sing With You” (that is, “New Town Plaza Sing With You”) events at several shopping malls in Kowloon and the New Territories of Hong Kong, the events initially proceeded in an orderly manner, but nearly 500 riot police suddenly entered the malls and went floor by floor, driving citizens away and stopping and checking them on the grounds that they had violated the “gathering ban,” and the events consequently turned into street clashes; she was also stopped on a street in Mong Kok and accused by police officers of violating the gathering ban, and was issued a ticket; she was falsely accused of stealing another person's phone and ordered to unlock her phone to prove her innocence; for the 2020 Hong Kong Legislative Council election, in July of that year she resolutely announced her intention to register for the pro-democracy camp's primary, despite the pressure and risks of the existing accusation of “rioting,” and secured a place in the New Territories West race, finishing third with 22,911 votes; on July 27, she and Tuen Mun Community Network member Chang Ho-sun, who was running in the same constituency, also registered to run in the 2020 Hong Kong Legislative Council election, contesting the New Territories West geographical constituency; she put forward a platform intended to benefit Hong Kong people: 1. A revolution in thought—decolonization, establishing Hong Kong people's sense of self and identity (that is, Hong Kong people had no right to participate in the transfer of sovereignty and were merely political tools in the hands of great powers; after the transfer, Hong Kong became a colony once again, under the dictatorship of the Chinese Communist Party, and Hong Kong people had never had control over the fate of our city); 2. Strengthen Hong Kong people's sense of self and identity (including language, culture, education, population policy, development of local industries, release of all protesters, withdrawal of the designation of the protests as riots, establishment of an independent investigative committee, and opposition to the National Security Law—nine major areas in total);

On January 6, 2021, because she had participated in the pro-democracy primaries the previous year, she was arrested along with more than 50 pro-democracy participants, all accused by Hong Kong police of violating the Hong Kong version of the National Security Law; on February 28 of that year, she and 46 others were formally charged by police with “conspiracy to subvert state power,” and a judge denied them bail; she was granted temporary bail by the High Court on December 21;

On August 18, 2022, she pleaded guilty to “conspiracy to subvert state power”; on July 13, 2023, because she had been charged with “rioting” in connection with the 2019 PolyU clashes and had pleaded guilty, she was ultimately sentenced to 3 years and 1 month in prison by the Hong Kong District Court; on November 19, 2024, the Hong Kong 47 case was collectively sentenced at the West Kowloon Magistrates' Courts (acting as the High Court), and she was again sentenced to 4 years and 5 months for supporting “Ink Has Fallen, No Regrets” and thus being regarded as an “anti-China, destabilizing Hong Kong element”; on December 18, 2024, she appealed her 4-year-and-5-month prison sentence, but after considering her overall sentence, the judge ruled that her earlier rioting sentence would not run concurrently with this case; as a result, the two sentences were added together, and her sentence is expected to run until October 2028. She is currently held at Lo Wu Correctional Institution in Hong Kong.