Veteran lawmaker and activist Martin Lee (
"He's already worked in the legislature for 23 years, and he just turned 70 this year," Democratic Party Chairman Albert Ho (
Hong Kong's best known democracy advocate, Lee has campaigned for direct elections for all political offices and served as the founding chairman of the Democratic Party from 1994 to 2002.
His lobbying efforts abroad, especially in Washington, have outraged China, which has labeled him a "traitor" to the country.
A former British colony that returned to Chinese rule in 1997, Hong Kong has never enjoyed full democracy under either ruler, but it enjoys Western-style civil liberties like freedom of the press and protest.
Hong Kong's leader is chosen by an 800-member committee loyal to Beijing. Half of its legislators are elected, with the rest chosen by interest groups.
Beijing ruled last year the territory could elect its own leader in 2017 and all of its legislators sometime after that. But democracy activists, who had been pushing for an earlier date, fear China will continue to screen candidates.
Lee was quoted as saying in Ming Pao Daily News newspaper yesterday that his biggest regret was not seeing full democracy during his political career.
He said he would continue his fight for democracy after the next legislative elections in September
"Of course I won't be on TV and won't meet with journalists as often," Lee was quoted as saying. "But I will come forward on the big issues, during the protests."
Four people jailed in the landmark Hong Kong national security trial of "47 democrats" accused of conspiracy to commit subversion were freed today after more than four years behind bars, the second group to be released in a month. Among those freed was long-time political and LGBTQ activist Jimmy Sham (岑子杰), who also led one of Hong Kong’s largest pro-democracy groups, the Civil Human Rights Front, which disbanded in 2021. "Let me spend some time with my family," Sham said after arriving at his home in the Kowloon district of Jordan. "I don’t know how to plan ahead because, to me, it feels
‘A THREAT’: Guyanese President Irfan Ali called on Venezuela to follow international court rulings over the region, whose border Guyana says was ratified back in 1899 Misael Zapara said he would vote in Venezuela’s first elections yesterday for the territory of Essequibo, despite living more than 100km away from the oil-rich Guyana-administered region. Both countries lay claim to Essequibo, which makes up two-thirds of Guyana’s territory and is home to 125,000 of its 800,000 citizens. Guyana has administered the region for decades. The centuries-old dispute has intensified since ExxonMobil discovered massive offshore oil deposits a decade ago, giving Guyana the largest crude oil reserves per capita in the world. Venezuela would elect a governor, eight National Assembly deputies and regional councilors in a newly created constituency for the 160,000
North Korea has detained another official over last week’s failed launch of a warship, which damaged the naval destroyer, state media reported yesterday. Pyongyang announced “a serious accident” at Wednesday last week’s launch ceremony, which crushed sections of the bottom of the new destroyer. North Korean leader Kim Jong-un called the mishap a “criminal act caused by absolute carelessness.” Ri Hyong-son, vice department director of the Munitions Industry Department of the Party Central Committee, was summoned and detained on Sunday, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported. He was “greatly responsible for the occurrence of the serious accident,” it said. Ri is the fourth person
At a calligraphy class in Hanoi, Hoang Thi Thanh Huyen slides her brush across the page to form the letters and tonal marks of Vietnam’s unique modern script, in part a legacy of French colonial rule. The history of romanized Vietnamese, or Quoc Ngu, links the arrival of the first Christian missionaries, colonization by the French and the rise to power of the Communist Party of Vietnam. It is now reflected in the country’s “bamboo diplomacy” approach of seeking strength through flexibility, or looking to stay on good terms with the world’s major powers. A month after Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) visited,
RSS