Members of the Hong Kong 47 include former elected officials, activists, journalists, trades union representatives, academics, social workers, and businessmen, some of whom have been persistent thorns in the side of Beijing.

Benny Tai, a legal academic and a ringleader of the Umbrella movement which occupied streets in central commercial areas of Hong Kong and Kowloon nearly a decade ago, received the harshest sentence of 10 years.

Other prominent figures sentenced included former teenage activist Joshua Wong, veteran legislative council members like Claudia Mo, a former journalist, and Leung Kwok-hung, a firebrand politician who frequently goes by the nickname “Long Hair”.

A spokesperson for the US consulate in Hong Kong said the US “strongly condemns” the sentencing, adding the defendants were “aggressively prosecuted and jailed for peacefully participating in normal political activity”.

Sir Keir Starmer met China’s president Xi Jinping for talks on Monday at the G20 summit in Brazil.