Raising the Alarm on Hong Kong’s Systemtic Abuse of Politcal Prisoners

The Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation joined a group of leading civil society organizations to raise the alarm about the systemic human rights abuses of political prisoners in Hong Kong. Read the full letter, addressed to the High Commissioner Volker Türk, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, below.

Dear High Commissioner Volker Türk, 

As a coalition of 52 civil society organizations committed to human rights and the rule of law, we write collectively to urgently raise serious concerns regarding the systemic abuses occurring inside Hong Kong’s prisons, as detailed in the recent report by the Committee for Freedom in Hong Kong (CFHK) Foundation, “We Were Made to Suffer: Systemic Abuse and Political Control Inside Hong Kong’s Prisons” (September 2025). 

The report documents harrowing violations such as prolonged and punitive solitary confinement far beyond internationally accepted limits; arbitrary and excessive use of solitary confinement and isolation to punish political prisoners; systemic physical, sexual, and psychological abuse tolerated by prison officials; chronic medical neglect resulting in severe deterioration and preventable deaths; widespread degradation of prison infrastructure and hygiene; and weaponization of psychiatric detention against dissidents. More than 700 political prisoners, including prominent human rights defenders, journalists, and pro-democracy activists such as Jimmy Lai, Leung Kwok-hung, Chow Hang-tung, and Joshua Wong, remain subject to extended isolation, communication censorship, and forced indoctrination through state-run “deradicalization” programs as they languish in jail.

Some of these violations have been documented by the UN human rights mechanism, including the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention opinions on Jimmy Lai and Chow Hang-tung‘s detention. Multiple UN member states have raised concerns about Chow’s repeated solitary confinement in the UN Secretary-General’s 2025 report on reprisals. 

These conditions blatantly violate Hong Kong’s obligations under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), the Convention Against Torture, the United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners (“Mandela Rules”), and other binding international standards. They also constitute cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment, and in many cases amount to torture. 

High Commissioner, we urge you to strengthen your Office’s monitoring of the human rights situation in Hong Kong and issue an independent report with findings and recommendations on Hong Kong prisons.  

In addition, we urge you to: 

• Demand unrestrained, independent access to all Hong Kong prisons, including facilities holding political prisoners;
• Call on the People’s Republic of China and the Hong Kong governments to immediately end all solitary confinement and isolation lasting longer than 15 days in accordance with the Mandela Rules; and
• Condemn the systemic suppression of political dissent through imprisonment and reiterate calls for the release of all political prisoners and imprisoned human rights defenders and journalists.

We also appeal to all UN Member States to use diplomatic and economic leverage and support investigations into abuses to hold accountable those who authorize or facilitate them, including senior officials in the Correctional Services Department and the Committee for Safeguarding National Security. 

The ongoing violations inside Hong Kong’s prisons—which reflect patterns of abuse long inflicted on Chinese dissidents, Uyghurs, and Tibetans, as documented through the UN human rights mechanism—represent a profound affront to human dignity and international human rights law. We intend to submit cases to the special procedures through the mechanism and stand ready to provide further evidence and support for the international community’s efforts to ensure justice and humane treatment for all persons in custody in Hong Kong. 

Respectfully, 

• Alliance for Citizens Rights
• ARTICLE 19 
• Australia Hong Kong Link 
• Bay Area Friends of Tibet
• Bonham Tree Aid CIC
• Canada-Hong Kong Link
• China Aid
• China Rights in Action (CRA)
• Committee for Freedom in Hong Kong Foundation
• Committee to Protect Journalists
• Dandelion Aid for Resilience & Empowerment
• Fortify Rights
• Freiheit für Hongkong e.V.
• Global Alliance for Tibet & Persecuted Minorities
• Grupo de Apoio ao Tibete-Portugal 
• Hong Kong Aid (港援)
• Hong Kong Committee in Norway
• Hong Kong Democracy Council
• Hong Kong Forum, Los Angeles
• Hong Kong Human Rights Front (Taiwan)
• Hong Kong Outlanders in Taiwan
• Hong Kong Watch
• Hong Kongers in San Francisco Bay Area
• Hongkonger in Deutschland e.V. (香港人在德國協會)
• Hongkongers in Britain (HKB)
• Human Rights Foundation
• Human Rights in China
• Index on Censorship 
• International Campaign for Tibet
• International Tibet Network
• JF Books
• Lady Liberty Hong Kong (LLHK)
• Lamp of Liberty
• Northern California Hong Kong Club 
• NY4HK
• Nyc852Hker
• PEN America
• PEN International
• Re-Water CIC
• Reporters Without Borders (RSF)
• Safeguard Defenders
• Santa Barbara Friends of Tibet
• SEArious For HKG
• Students for a Free Tibet
• The European Hong Kong Diaspora Alliance (歐洲香港人聯盟)
• The Hong Kong Scots
• The Rights Practice
• Tibet Initiative Deutschland e.V. 
• Toronto Association for Democracy in China
• Vancouver Society in Support of Democratic Movement (VSSDM)
• Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation
• World Organisation against Torture (OMCT)