Hong Kong police on Wednesday (29.12.2021) arrested six members and former board members of Stand News, a digital outlet popular with the opposition and one of the few remaining pro-democracy and beijing-critical media outlets in the former British colony.
The operation involved more than 200 police officers who carried out a raid on the offices of the media and searches of the homes of those arrested, whom they consider suspected of “printing or distributing seditious material.”
Those arrested include the current director of the outlet, Lam Shiu-tung; his predecessor until last month, Chung Pui-kuen, and singer and activist Denise Ho Wan, also a former board member and one of the most recognizable faces of the Hong Kong opposition, as well as former lawmaker Margaret Ng.
Hong Kong police on Wednesday (29.12.2021) arrested six members and former board members of Stand News, a digital outlet popular with the opposition and one of the few remaining pro-democracy and beijing-critical media outlets in the former British colony.
The operation involved more than 200 police officers who carried out a raid on the offices of the media and searches of the homes of those arrested, whom they consider suspected of “printing or distributing seditious material.”
Footage shows national security police taking boxes of items out of the Stand News newsroom during a raid on Wednesday. Full story: https://t.co/Fd798Glect pic.twitter.com/pcQJGk8Pa7
— Hong Kong Free Press HKFP (@hkfp) December 29, 2021
Those arrested include the current director of the outlet, Lam Shiu-tung; his predecessor until last month, Chung Pui-kuen, and singer and activist Denise Ho Wan, also a former board member and one of the most recognizable faces of the Hong Kong opposition, as well as former lawmaker Margaret Ng.
The arrests come as authorities crack down on dissent in China’s semi-autonomous city. Police charged former newspaper editor Jimmy Lai with sedition. His Apple Daily newspaper closed after freezing its assets.
Benedict Rogers, co-founder and ceo of the NGO Hong Kong Watch, said the arrests are “an all-out attack on press freedom.”
These events also follow the removal of sculptures and other artwork from university campuses last week. The works commemorated the victims of China’s crackdown on pro-democracy protesters in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square in 1989.
