Prominent Hong Kong union leader arrested after prison visit: Source

HONG KONG - Hong Kong police on Thursday (March 9) arrested veteran union leader Elizabeth Tang after she visited her pro-democracy activist husband who is jailed at a high security prison, according to a source close to the couple and domestic media.

Tang is the General Secretary of the International Domestic Workers Federation and the former chief executive of the now disbanded Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions (CTU).

The CTU was Hong Kong's largest opposition trade union coalition that dissolved in 2021 after several members received messages threatening their safety, the group said at the time.

Hong Kong's pro-Beijing Wen Wei Po newspaper said Tang had been arrested by the city's national security police for allegedly "colluding with foreign forces" and "endangering national security".

The source close to the couple said she had been arrested after visting her husband, Lee Cheuk-yan. Lee, 66, is one of Hong Kong's leading democracy activists, who has been jailed for unlawful assembly and other offences.

The source declined to be identified due to the fear of reprisals from authorities. Hong Kong police did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment.

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More than 230 people, including opposition activists and politicians, have been jailed or charged in Hong Kong under a national security law promulgated by Beijing in 2020 in response to mass pro-democracy protests a year earlier.

The law has been criticised by some Western governments as a tool to curb free speech and dissent.

On Monday, the United Nations' Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural rights urged Chinese and Hong Kong authorities to review the security law, and expressed concern over a trade union ordinance which it said had been used to "hamper the exercise of the rights to freely form trade unions."

The Hong Kong and Chinese governments say the law has brought stability to the city, and reject claims it has been used to target democratic opposition.