Australia expresses deep concern about the imprisonment of Hong Kong journalists.
Chung Pui-kuen and Patrick Lam have been convicted over 11 articles they wrote, which the CCP regime found to be ‘seditious.’
Foreign Minister Penny Wong expresses Australia’s deep concern over the guilty verdicts handed down to two Hong Kong journalists accused of publishing seditious material in Stand News, an online news site that ceased operations in December 2021. This platform was among the last media outlets in the city that openly criticized the government amid the crackdown on dissent following widespread pro-democracy protests in 2019.
“We have consistently raised the issue of the widespread application of national security laws and the repression of civil society and journalists with Hong Kong and China,” Wong stated in a post on X.
The former Editor-in-Chief of Stand News, Chung Pui-kuen, and its acting Editor-in-Chief, Patrick Lam, were arrested on December 29, 2021, after a police raid on its newsroom. These convictions mark the first involving the media since Hong Kong’s return to Beijing’s control in 1997.
The parent company of Stand News, Best Pencil Ltd, was also found guilty.
Chung and Lam pleaded not guilty to conspiracy to publish and reproduce seditious publications. They now face potential sentences of up to two years in prison and a fine of 5,000 Hong Kong dollars (US$641).
Press Freedom Disappearing
Judge Kwok Wai-kin stated in his written judgment that Stand News had become a “danger to national security” and had even “become a tool to smear and vilify the Central Authorities in Beijing and the Hong Kong SAR Government.” The newspaper’s editorial stance supported “Hong Kong local autonomy.”
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The 11 seditious stories incited citizens to commit illegal acts and inflamed hatred against the judiciary, according to the judge.
He argued that a conviction was justified for speech deemed to have the potential to “damage” national security and aimed at undermining Beijing authorities or the Hong Kong government.
Human rights organizations criticized the verdict, with Reporters Without Borders urging Hong Kong to halt its negative campaign against press freedom. The organization’s World Press Freedom Index has seen the former British colony drop from 18th to 135th place over the past two decades.
The United States expressed concerns that the case against both editors creates a chilling effect on others in the press and media in Hong Kong.
Beijing’s increasingly aggressive stance towards dissent in the territory has led several foreign-owned media and non-governmental organizations to relocate their headquarters. Nonetheless, numerous international media outlets still operate in the city, which remains a home to many foreign journalists.
Prosecutors alleged that a total of 17 stories were seditious, mostly comprising interviews with former opposition lawmakers and activists, many of whom are currently incarcerated or living in self-imposed exile.
