An assistant to lawmaker 'Long Hair' Leung Kwok-hung was arrested yesterday for an incident that took place outside Beijing's liaison office in Hong Kong last December.
Penny Keung Ling-cheung, was arrested at his home in Sha Tin for throwing corn flour during a League of Social Democrats' demonstration to demand the release of tainted milk-scandal activist Zhao Lianhai.
Meanwhile, fellow league member Steve Wong Chun-kit was charged yesterday with acting in a disorderly manner, rather than common assault, over an incident in March in which Chief Executive Donald Tsang Yam-kuen claimed he was injured during a protest outside the Museum of History in Tsim Sha Tsui.
Wong is due to appear in court on May 4.
Keung, 26, was released on HK$500 bail and must report back to police on May 16.
Keung said three officers from the Hong Kong Island Regional Crime Unit arrived at about 10am and arrested him on suspicion of breaching the Public Order Ordinance. He said the arrest was 'political' and was an attempt by the 'Hong Kong government to suppress freedom of expression of protesters'. He was among a small group of protesters who went to the central government's liaison office to call for the release of Zhao, father of a child affected by milk powder tainted with the industrial chemical melamine.
Zhao was sentenced to 21/2 years' jail on November 10 but was paroled in late December on medical grounds. Keung threw a plastic packet of corn flour outside the office in a gesture to symbolise the tainted milk formula.