Top Hong Kong University official reveals he would welcome national security probe into student union leaders over resolution lauding ‘sacrifice’ of man who stabbed police officer
- HKU governing council chairman Arthur Li says student council members behind resolution should take responsibility for their actions
- Council resolution expressed ‘deep sadness’ at death of attacker who knifed officer in Causeway Bay on July 1
A senior University of Hong Kong administrator on Thursday said he would welcome a national security investigation into a student group which passed a resolution mourning the death of a man who stabbed a police officer and then killed himself in Causeway Bay last week.
Arthur Li Kwok-cheung, chairman of the university’s governing council, also told the Post that management would look at whether members of the HKU Students’ Union Council should be expelled for approving the motion, which voiced appreciation for the lone assailant’s “sacrifice to Hong Kong”.
“The resolution is something indecent and not acceptable,” said Li, also a member of the city leader’s de facto cabinet, the Executive Council.
“They [union council members] are basically supporting violence and the attack on July 1, so we should let relevant authorities look into whether the new security law has been violated. They have to be accountable for what they have done.”
The Beijing-imposed national security law outlaws acts of secession, subversion, terrorism and collusion with foreign forces. The maximum sentence for breaking the legislation’s most serious offences is life imprisonment.
HKU believed that such “radical” individuals formed “just a minority” of the student population, according to Li, who noted the governing council only found out about the resolution through media reports.