FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 5, 2026
FREE CHINA MOVEMENT CONDEMNS HONG KONG ARRESTS OVER PRINCE EDWARD REMEMBRANCE: NATIONAL SECURITY MUST NOT BECOME A LICENSE TO CRIMINALIZE MEMORY
WASHINGTON, D.C., September 5, 2026 — The Free China Movement strongly condemns the arrest of three people by Hong Kong national-security police over activities connected with the August 31 remembrance outside Prince Edward MTR station.
Hong Kong authorities say two men and one woman, aged 33 to 79, were arrested on September 3 over alleged conduct including standing outside the station with bouquets and shouting slogans that police characterize as seditious. These are allegations and have not been adjudicated in court.
“When a government becomes afraid of flowers, remembrance and peaceful words, the danger comes from a political system that has begun to treat memory itself as a security threat.”
Holding flowers, mourning, remembering a controversial event, questioning an official historical narrative and peacefully expressing political views must never by themselves become national-security crimes.
FCM Has Repeatedly Warned Against Turning National Security Into a Tool of Political Repression
The Prince Edward arrests reinforce a concern the Free China Movement has repeatedly raised: national security must protect people from genuine threats; it must never become an elastic political justification for suppressing peaceful dissent, religious belief, journalism, historical remembrance or advocacy for democracy.
FCM has challenged the use of national-security, subversion, separatism and related political charges against peaceful democratic activists and other prisoners of conscience. Its position is consistent: peacefully seeking democracy is not subversion; remembering historical injustice is not a security offense; criticizing a government is not an attack on a nation.
Genuine espionage, terrorism and violence may properly be investigated under clearly defined laws, credible evidence, due process and independent judicial review. Stretching “national security” to encompass flowers, memorial gatherings, peaceful slogans, journalism or political criticism instead risks transforming a legitimate governmental responsibility into an instrument of repression.
Democratic Governments Warned of This Danger
When the National Security Law was imposed in 2020, G7 foreign ministers expressed grave concern that it would threaten fundamental rights and freedoms in Hong Kong and urged the Mainland Chinese government to reconsider. The European Union has subsequently condemned politically motivated national-security prosecutions and the shrinking space for freedom of expression, peaceful assembly and independent civil society in Hong Kong.
Those warnings cannot simply be repeated while the boundaries of permissible expression and remembrance continue to contract. If national-security legislation can reach a person carrying flowers to remember an event authorities would prefer society to forget, democratic governments must ask where the limiting principle now lies.
FCM Calls for Immediate Action
- Disclose precisely what words and individual acts form the basis for each arrest.
- Release anyone detained solely for peaceful remembrance, mourning, holding flowers or nonviolent political expression.
- Guarantee independent legal counsel, due process, open proceedings and meaningful judicial review.
- Stop using national-security and sedition legislation to suppress peaceful political expression and contested historical memory.
- Restore the freedoms of expression, peaceful assembly and association promised to Hong Kong under the Basic Law and international commitments.
FCM calls upon the G7, European Union, United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and other democratic governments to publicly address these arrests and seek an explanation from Hong Kong authorities. Governments that previously warned against using national-security legislation against peaceful political activity should apply that principle consistently when remembrance itself becomes the object of national-security enforcement.
Silence now would weaken the force of their earlier condemnations.
“No government owns the memory of its people. Hong Kong residents have the right to remember their history, mourn their losses, ask questions and speak about their experiences without fearing that flowers or peaceful words will bring national-security police to their door.”
Media Contact
Free China Movement / 自由中国运动
Email: contact@freechina.live
Phone: +1 (571) 895-7066
Website: https://freechina.live/
About the Free China Movement
The Free China Movement advocates for freedom, democracy, human rights, constitutional government and the rule of law for the people of Mainland China. FCM documents political and religious repression, supports peaceful democratic change, and advances a future in which fundamental rights are protected by constitutional institutions rather than subordinated to one-party political power.
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