Two Hong Kong News Outlet Editors Face Sedition Charges

12/31

Two senior editors of Stand News, a pro-democracy news group based in Hong Kong, were charged on Thursday with conspiracy to publish seditious information, police said, following a raid that garnered international outrage for China's crackdown on press freedom in the city.

On Wednesday, over 200 police officers stormed the office of the Stand News online office, taking phones, computers, and documents, as well as thousands of dollars in cash.

Seven current and former senior editors, as well as former members of the board, have been arrested. During the search, acting editor-in-chief Patrick Lam was handcuffed and transported to the headquarters, Channel News Asia reported.

The National Security police announced Thursday that they had filed charges against two individuals with "conspiracy to disseminate seditious publications."

Although the statement did not identify the individuals charged, certain local media reports said they were former senior editors at the publication.

According to the Associated Press, who cited local reports, the former senior editors are Chung Pui-kuen and Lam.

Lam and Pui-kuen were charged, along with Stand News' parent firm, with conspiring "to publish and/or reproduce seditious publications" together with "other persons," according to court documents.



The charge sheet also included the promotion of "hatred or contempt for the government or to provoke disaffection," as well as the instigation of "persons to violence."

Carrie Lam, Hong Kong's chief executive, stated that the action was not intended to stifle the media or press freedom, but rather to curb what she described as "seditious activities."

"Journalism is not seditious... but seditious conduct under the pretext of news reporting cannot be accepted," Lam stated.

China has strengthened its grip on Hong Kong in the months since large and occasionally violent pro-democracy protests erupted in the financial hub in 2019, employing a broad national security law to repress dissent.

Media advocacy groups and some Western countries condemned the raid and arrests as a symptom of the continued "deterioration" of press freedoms in the former British colony since China enacted a broad national security law in 2021.

The Committee to Protect Journalists and the United Nations Human Rights Office in Geneva expressed alarm at the "very quick closure" of Hong Kong's civic space and civil society outlets "to talk freely and express themselves."

Stand News, founded in 2014 as a non-profit organization, was the most prominent pro-democracy journal in Hong Kong following the shutdown of jailed businessman Jimmy Lai's Apple Daily tabloid last year because of the national security inquiry.