Situationen i Hong Kong

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Hong Kong
‘We fought the good fight’: journalists in Hong Kong reel from assault on media

Newsrooms closures and exodus from territory are result of ‘draconian’ national security law introduced in 2020

As the last news programme came to a close and anchors bade farewell to their online audience on 3 January, Chris Yeung, the founder and chief writer of Citizen News, gathered together his staff and tried to strike an optimistic tone.

“Remember our very best memories,” ...
"No one knows what will happen next. Don’t worry. Just remember the happy things.”

It was the day 90 largely pro-establishment legislators were sworn in. The previous evening, the independent Chinese-language news outlet of five years said it was closing. It justified the decision citing a deteriorating media environment and concerns for the safety of its staff.

On 4 January, another outlet, Mad Dog Daily, followed suit and halted operations together with Citizen News.

An exodus of journalists and editors from the territory’s much-acclaimed news outlets such as Cable TV and its public broadcaster, RTHK, in the last couple of years have alarmed free speech campaigners in the city and beyond.

Barely a week ago, another Chinese-language outlet, Stand News, was forced to close after 200 police officers raided its office and detained seven current and former employees. Two former senior editors were charged with conspiring to publish seditious materials and denied bail.

The Stand News arrests came a day after Jimmy Lai, the former owner of the popular tabloid Apple Daily, and six of its former journalists were given new charges of “conspiracy to ‘print, publish, sell, offer for sale, distribute, display and/or reproduce seditious publications”. Last June, the newspaper was forced to close. State media in Beijing called the newspaper a “rotten apple that plagued Hong Kong for 20 years”. Amnesty International said it was “the blackest day for media freedom in Hong Kong’s recent history”.

Hong Kong – once a bastion of free speech within China’s territory – the intensified move against independent news outlets began shortly after Beijing imposed a controversial national security law in the summer of 2020.

fake news legislation.

there have been waves of arrests of individuals – from journalists to politicians – who disagree with Beijing and the Hong Kong governments. According to Reporters Without Borders, close to two dozen journalists and press freedom campaigners have been arrested since the implementation of the National Security Law in June 2020.

Some opposition politicians – including Nathan Law, once the youngest lawmaker in the history of the legislative council of Hong Kong – are now living in exile.

But it is not only local Chinese-language news outlets that are feeling the chill. International news outlets such as the New York Times are already shifting their base to elsewhere in the region because – according to the US company – the national security law “unsettled news organisations and created uncertainty about the city’s prospects as a hub for journalism”.

The Chinese government has used the national security law to crush Hong Kong’s pro-democracy opposition with a ferocity that has surprised even some pro-Beijing officials in the territory.

With Security Law as a Cudgel, Beijing Cracks Down on Hong Kong
The spirit and the letter of the new law has been used to crush Hong Kong’s opposition. In the latest blow to the pro-democracy movement, the government postponed an election, citing the coronavirus.

In the last week alone, the authorities have ousted a tenured law professor at the University of Hong Kong who has been a key figure in the city’s democracy movement, and arrested four young activists on suspicion that they expressed support online for independence. They have also barred a dozen candidates from running for the legislature, using opposition to the security law as new ground for disqualification.

On Friday, the authorities postponed for a year the election itself, which had been scheduled for Sept. 6. While they cited the coronavirus pandemic as justification for the move, it underscored Beijing’s fears that pro-democracy candidates could triumph.