5 Hong Kong speech therapists behind politically provocative children’s books jailed 19 months each under sedition law

The book series, published between June 2020 and March last year, focused on the struggles between a village of sheep and a group of intruding wolves

Some defendants adamant, as one likens prosecution to the trials of Socrates and Galileo, with authorities defining the ‘correct historical perspective’

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The children’s books were said to have depicted mainland China in a bad light. Photo: Edmond So

Published: 2:22pm, 10 Sep 2022Updated: 8:48pm, 10 Sep 2022

A District Court judge has sentenced five speech therapists behind a series of children’s books containing provocative depictions of mainland China to 19 months in jail each under Hong Kong’s colonial-era sedition law.

Judge Kwok Wai-kin condemned the five for embarking on a “brainwashing exercise” and indoctrinating children in separatist ideology as he handed down the terms on Saturday.

“The harm caused by the defendants’ crime is to the children in their mindset, and once they [have] internalised this mindset, the seed of instability will be sown in [mainland China] and [Hong Kong],” he said.

The books, published between June 2020 and March last year, tell the story of a village of sheep forced to defend itself against a group of intruding wolves following the shepherd’s departure.

Kwok, who is among the few jurists approved by the city’s leader to adjudicate national security cases, held on Wednesday the publications were clear insinuations that Beijing ruined Hongkongers’ “happy life” after Britain handed over the city to China in 1997.