In late July 2026, Lee Ying-chi, a dentist and known activist, was summarily dismissed from her clinic, a non-profit organisation with government partnerships, shortly after staging a peaceful solo demonstration on the anniversary of the 2019 Yuen Long mob attack (21 July). During the protest, Lee held a watermelon and a photo of a prominent, unprosecuted attacker from 2019 (known as “Watermelon Man”) and was stopped and searched by police. Three days after this widely reported incident, clinic management pressured her to resign.
Human Resources claimed she had failed to declare a past fine for “unlicensed fundraising,” but explicitly stated that retaining her would jeopardise the organisation’s “partnership with the government,” asking her to “sympathise with their situation.” When Lee refused to resign voluntarily, asserting she had never let her activism interfere with her professional duties or work hours, she was fired with immediate effect. She was barred from packing her personal belongings and crucially, prevented from properly handing over her patients’ clinical care. Therefore, demonstrating a systemic pattern of harassment designed to economically and socially isolate civil society actors.