On Saturday 23 March, three members of Sutton Amnesty joined a protest outside the old Wilko store in Sutton organised by the Hong Kong Culture and Arts Society. The aim was to draw attention to the recently introduced Article 23 of Hong Kong’s National Security Law. Hong Kong’s leader, John Lee, said, “ It is necessary to guard against potential sabotage and undercurrents that try to create troubles.” The fear is it will be used to further erode the civil liberty of residents. Most worrying is it allows trials in secret, and detention for 16 days without charge. It also threatens companies and organisations from expulsion if they don’t comply. Article 23 expands on the Beijing-imposed national security law, which already criminalises secession, subversion, terrorism and collusion with foreign forces.
 
The protest was attended by around 25 folk, mostly of Hong Kong origin. Previous protests by the group were targeted by agents of the Chinese state in an effort to disrupt it and intimidate those attending. As a result many of the protesters wore face masks to mask their identity. A sensible precaution as many still had family back home. Thankfully there was no disruption this time, which may have been as a result of the small police presence in the High Street whilst we were there. Such is the spread of the Chinese police state in the UK, you can’t be too careful.
 
For the two hours we were there, we held posters against Article 23 whilst the group played interviews and music through a Bluetooth speaker. This method of outreach proved very effective to the passing public. We hope to have a member of the Culture and Arts Society at a future meeting.