[ad_1]
A veteran Hong Kong journalist has been arrested by nationwide safety police for allegedly conspiring to publish “seditious supplies”, a police supply and native media mentioned, within the newest blow towards press freedom.
Allan Au, a 54-year-old reporter and journalism lecturer, was arrested in a daybreak raid on Monday by Hong Kong’s nationwide safety police unit, a number of native media shops reported.
A senior police supply confirmed Au’s arrest on a cost of “conspiracy to publish seditious supplies”. Police have but to launch an official assertion.
Au was a former columnist for Stand Information, a web based information platform that was shuttered final December after authorities froze the corporate’s property utilizing a nationwide safety legislation.
Two different senior workers of Stand Information have already been charged with sedition.
Nationwide safety prices have additionally been introduced towards jailed pro-democracy media tycoon Jimmy Lai and 6 former senior executives of Apple Day by day.
As soon as Hong Kong’s hottest tabloid, Apple Day by day collapsed final 12 months when its newsroom was raided and property had been frozen underneath the safety legislation.
Quickly after Stand Information was shut down, Au started to write down “good morning” every day on his Fb to substantiate his security. One of many metropolis’s most skilled native columnists, he was a Knight fellow at Stanford College in 2005 and earned a doctorate from the Chinese language College of Hong Kong.
In 2017 Au printed a guide about censorship in Hong Kong titled Freedom Underneath 20 Shades of Shadow. Au spent greater than a decade working for RTHK, Hong Kong’s authorities broadcaster, operating a present affairs present.
However he was axed final 12 months after the authorities declared a shake-up that started remodeling the as soon as editorially impartial broadcaster into one thing extra resembling Chinese language state media.
Launched by colonial ruler Britain in 1938, sedition was lengthy criticised as an anti-free speech legislation, together with by lots of the pro-Beijing native newspapers now praising its use.
By the point of the 1997 handover, it had not been used for many years however remained on the books. It was utilized by police and prosecutors within the wake of giant and typically violent pro-democracy protests in 2019.
Over the previous two years sedition has been wielded towards journalists, unionists, activists, a former pop star and unusual residents, main the town’s media-freedom score to plummet.
Sedition is presently separate from the sweeping nationwide safety legislation that Beijing imposed on Hong Kong in 2020. Nonetheless, the courts deal with it as a nationwide safety offence, which implies that bail is usually denied for these charged.
Subsequent month Hong Kong is anticipated to get a brand new Beijing-anointed chief, former safety chief John Lee, who oversaw the police response to the 2019 democracy protests and subsequent crackdown.
Requested on Monday whether or not Au’s arrest would worsen press freedom, Lee declined to remark, saying all investigations must be carried out independently.
[ad_2]
Source link